Lonely Money
by GGElaina
Summary: She nestled against the long teenage billionaire as he buried his head into her hair. The blonde locks blocked a small flash from the Sennen Ring as a phased Bakura wrapped his arms around her. "You'll have to choose eventually." SKxOC, NC, Angst
1. Prologue

**Authors Note: This story was written for the 2011 National Novel Writing Month. An internal challenge to write a 50,000 word Novel in the month of November. I completed this challenge and this is the finished result. Please review fairly and honestly!**

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><p>"This isn't over, Pharaoh!" A white haired spirit screamed. A deep chuckle rippled through the empty air as he slipped away into the night. A tri-colored, spiky haired kid collapsed to the sand, allowing large gulps of air to fill his lungs as his friends gathered around him in concern.<p>

"That was downright crazy, Yuge." A fluffy blonde haired boy yelled above the silence. "But it's a good thing it's all over now." The four nodded in unison.

"I don't think we'll ever see him again." The short boy picked up the glittering gold pendant that had been around his opponent's neck just moments before. A dark voice chuckled within the pendant.

**And you never did, Pharaoh. Lucky for me, however, someone else did.**

As the Pharaoh walked into the light and away from his friends, everyone was confident that the stone would never be disturbed again. But humans are very unpredictable creatures. The group slept peacefully two years later as a handful of men pulled open the dusty tomb.

"Look at all this gold! There must be millions of dollars in gold in this room alone! And we could just keep it all for ourselves!" The weakest of the team members stumbled forward and hugged the stone like a family member he hadn't seen in several years.

"You know that won't be done..." A man in a dark suit walked down the musty stairs in disgust. The architect shuddered at the sound of the voice. "I hired you to find me something valuable for the upcoming historical auction. Not to try and swindle me." A groan emitted from deep inside his throat.

"Would have never dreamt of it, sir. I was..." A single gunshot silenced the rest of his sentence as he crashed to the floor; blood and thicker substances covering his team. A tremble ran through the men in the room but they continued working. The archeologists slowly lifted each gold piece out of the stone where it polished, examined, authenticated and shipped off to some undisclosed location. A white haired spirit sat patiently in a shroud of pure darkness. The bumps of the truck, the train, the plane were left unnoticed to him. Hundreds of rich entrepreneurs sat before his pendant as he was put on parade in front of them all.

"Sold to Dr. Edmond T. Langston for two million dollars, congratulations!" A white blonde slender man dressed from head to toe in white expensive cloth smirked confidently. The pendant was placed neatly into a black box and into a little black gift bag.

"So you think this is a good idea? You spent a great deal of money on that, sir." Hadel, his own personal butler whispered slowly.

"The cost was not important, it could have been much more. And yes, she may be a worthless deserter, but she is still my daughter." He kept his face stone neutral but he gripped the pen in his hand a bit tighter. He scrawled the name on the box quickly and handed it off. The pendant gave him a depressing feeling whenever he was around it and he wanted it away as quickly as possible. He felt a pain in his chest, the need to end everything, his life, just to be away from the wretched thing. He shivered and leaned back into the kitchen table chair.

A white blonde girl in ripped jeans sat on her ragged couch, staring blankly at the small TV before her. The news brought a depressing atmosphere inside the small apartment. News of the sort was sure to catch viewers. The world today revolved around money. A knock on the door made her shift her attention from the television. At 5:45 pm., it was too late for anyone of importance to be there, as if anyone would be there to visit her anyway. When they knocked again, she knew it wasn't a figment of her imagination, and got up to answer the door. A man in all brown looked cheerily down at her.

Delivery men came in two types and two types only. The overly cheery ones who acted like they would love to do this for the rest of their lives or the indifferent ones where you could never tell whether they really could care less about their jobs or whether behind that stoic look they are planning on stabbing you in the eye with the ball-point pen they hand you for your signature. Or maybe the overly cheery ones were the ones to look out for.

"Ma'am?" She looked up quickly. He had asked a question and she hadn't heard it because she was to busy thinking about whether he really wanted to stab her behind that smile. She was good at that. He handed her a clipboard, pen attached and went to dig inside the nifty little shoulder bag. She signed her name, Elaina Havert, and handed it back to him; having it be replaced with a cardboard box about as big as a piece of paper. She closed the door behind him as he departed with a cheery have a nice evening and was on his way. Her eyes wandered over to the upper left hand corner; the return address read Langston Enterprise. Her father. She blinked slowly. She flipped the box around in several different directions fairly quickly, attempting to figure out what was inside without actually opening the package. There were no special occasions coming up, no holidays, even her birthday, was months away. It had been several years since they had had any contact with each other.

A year ago she had moved out of her home, became emancipated, took her mothers maiden name, and moved across the country. He sent her money every once in awhile, when she needed it. She never asked him for anything, he just seemed to always know when times were growing tough for her; like he was keeping tabs on her. Watching her. The thought made her shiver and come back to her predicament. Whenever he sent her money it was directly to her bank account. He never sent any amount of money in the form of cash. He was a business owner, he knew better than to think that all of it would make it to its destination if he chose that method. And it had been months since he had sent her any form of communication; verbal or written. He had seemingly given up after the first few months. She detested talking to her father. The conversations always somehow lead to one topic every time. Would she come back home? She knew why he wanted her back home, and she wouldn't have any of it. Apart from that, why would he send a written letter by UPS? If he wanted, he could just find her new email address or her changed phone number.

Slowly, she peeled the tape from the top of the box, choosing the method that would take the longest, and pulled the top open. A sleek leather box fit snuggly inside of the cheap cardboard. She laughed noisily as a metaphor hit her that she was sure her father had intended. A raggedy, cheap appearance with rich luxurious insides, just like her. He hated that she chose to live such a simple and down right poor life style over a lavish life she could have if she only went back home. She pulled the cover off of the box and gasped at the contents. A pure gold piece of jewelry rested contently inside on a pillow of velvet. An encircled triangle with the Eye of Horus in the center, five cones dangling evenly apart on the lower half, stared back at her. She knew it was intended to be a necklace for there was a hoop at the top to fit a piece of rope through. A durable thick chain of gold was looped through it. She lifted it out of the box, afraid that it would somehow crumble underneath her fingers if she handled it to roughly. It was a little larger than her hand and seemed heavy. She reached out to touch it, so the light would reflect off of it and a shock swam through her veins.

She gasped in pain and went to let it go but the muscles in her hand wouldn't allow it. She stared at it as a strong burning in her veins washed painfully slow up her arm. Like morphine going through an IV. The pain was sudden and sharp but it began to dilute and there was suddenly nothing. She was just numb. She let out a sigh of relief as she achieved the high. The familiar numb she cried for everyday. She clutched the metal to her chest as the same sensation ran straight to her heart. She didn't know what was making this happen but she didn't want any of it to stop. A gleam from the pendant hit a white paper on the floor she had not seen before.

**Try not to pawn this like you have everything else, Kitten. – Love Daddy**


	2. Sennen Ring

**Sennen Ring**

A pair of dark chocolate brown eyes stared around at the room he was left in. His new host was most amusing. The dwelling he assumed she called her home was even more so. The place was small, down right miniscule, but she was small as well so she probably enjoyed the cramped spaces more than he. The tips of his spiked white hair gently against the ceiling as straightened himself to his full length. His pendant was sitting on a small table beside the couch just under a cheap lamp. He sat on the wood slowly, testing his weight. The room was dark in all aspects of the word. She hadn't left him until the sun was threatening to come up so the moon was high in the sky. All of the curtains were open, giving the place a ghostly hue. The carpet was dark and viciously worn down. It needed to be replaced soon before it was whittled down to the base. The walls were covered in fake maple wood paneling that was chipped in several places. Clear out all the furniture, redo the carpet and polish the paneling and the room would look halfway decent.

Everything in the room was earthy. Black and brown seemed to be the predominant color scheme with flecks of green and tan here and there, but the more he looked around the more he began to wonder if she had planned it this way or out of luck the room managed to pull together. The couch was dirt brown with small patterns of tan throughout the cushions; the brown was a slightly darker shade then the rest of the couch, unnoticeable unless you were truly looking for it. The fabric was frayed at the bottom of the arm rests and on the one side he could see, she used to have a cat. The glass on the coffee table in front of the couch was clouded and scratched. Papers were scattered throughout the surface. He grabbed one and looked at it, squinting at the perfectly printed English and scuffed. English was not his strong suit and even if it was none of the things on the list made any sense to him. Advanced Calculus, Literature Analysis, Advanced Ancient Civilization Analysis, Quantum Physics. He tossed it back onto the table and continued to look around.

There was a small television sitting a top a dusty wooden table on the other wall. This was something he was familiar with. His former host had one, and he remembered sitting in front of it in the dark hours of the night while he was sleeping and laughing hysterically when a generic modern day wench was sucker punched in the face by some guy in a bar in some place named Jersey Shore. He flipped it on, waiting for her to come out into the room to shut it back off, then began to hit the button to continue on to the next channel when he realized that after three different channels they began to repeat. Two of the channels held annoying people with large heads talking about god or a product they desperately were attempting to sell to insomniacs and the other was channel where a man in a suit stared at the screen and listed off what had happened around the world that day. He blinked slowly, listening to how someone in Israel had blown himself up in attempt to kill a bus full of school children. He chuckled softly before turning the television back off.

He walked over to a makeshift bookcase in the corner. There were books crammed in all of the available spaces, several in piles on top and around it as well. There were books of all sorts in the case, thick leather bounds and thin long paperbacks. The majority seemed to hold books that centered on Psychology; a hobby or a career choice, he snorted. He may just have to kill her now if her career choice was to be a shrink. Some of the books however were not non-fiction books. In fact some of them centered on fairy-tales and mythology. He smiled. An innocent little girl who still believed in Happily Ever After... Everything in the room seemed to be old or hand-me-downs. So how had she come to acquire the Sennen Ring? He remembered the man who has bought his ring. He was tall and rich with cropped blonde hair that was nearly white as snow. His eyes were cold blue. Not deep blue, more ice like, closer to white with a tinge of the blue. The white haired spirit stalked down the hall slowly, turning into the first room he came across.

The girl was lying on the bed. The smooth pale skin of her shoulders peaked up from the moth eaten comforter. A low hum came from the ceiling fan directly above her bed; the ceiling seemed to be shaking slightly as it was switched to its highest setting. Under her covers with the ceiling fan on high in the middle of September; logical to say the least. Her hair was long and white, so blonde it looked like snow with sun rays flecked throughout it. He nodded to himself, obviously the daughter of the man who had purchased his ring. Her features were fair; pale skin with a bit of tinge in the cheeks so she didn't look entirely dead. His dark lashed lids swam down over his eyes as he melted into the darkness. Time seemed to slow to a crawl around him. His slow steady heartbeat pounded in his ears above the eerie silence. He could feel every drop of blood that flowed through his veins. His limbs felt heavier as the blood thickened and burned in his veins like magma. Yet the burn wasn't painful; it was a pleasant burn that threatened to put him to sleep. He grinned sheepishly, showing abnormally sharp teeth as he made a move to enter the room. His foot stopped at an invisible force just as he stepped inside of the door frame. A hand lazily rose up and reached out towards the bed. A smooth surface, glassy and invisible stopped him from advancing any farther into the room. He smiled slowly as he rested his palm against the invisible wall. The Sennen Ring had a fairly short range when it came to interacting with the outside world when his host wasn't wearing it.

**Hmm,****it****seems****you****were****spared****tonight...**He wandered back out into the main room of the small dwelling and plopped himself onto the couch. Over 3000 years of sleeping, he had no desire to add anymore time to that number. He began leafing through the papers on the table once again. He had no intention of revealing himself to his host anytime in the near future. The thrill of a new one was watching them squirm as the Ring's magic worked on them slowly. He intended to use the full extent of his powers to frighten her as much as possible before he needed to reveal himself for her safety or his own. Although, since he had no desire to talk to her to learn information about her he had to start somewhere. A name on any of these papers would be a good one. He searched for a moment before coming across another flawless white stack of papers. Jennifer Donovan was printed over the top and he curiously flipped through it. His former host had similar papers scattered throughout his former home for school. Papers or Essays he vaguely remembered them being called as his hikari explained why he had been awake until the earlier morning on some school nights. Fifty-two pages on a Calculus paper, he blinked slowly and grunted. This one may not be as interesting as he had once suspected. Donovan... The man who had bought his ring was Langston if he recalled. A small white card was sitting on the edge of the table.

**Try ****not ****to ****paw n****this ****like ****you ****have ****every thing ****else, ****Kitten.**** – ****Love ****Daddy**

He eyed the paper suspiciously, noticing the obvious possessive tone of the simple note that had obviously been left with his ring. He played with the paper absent mindedly as he stared up at the slowly rising sun.

**Sorry, ****Daddy. ****But ****it ****seems ****your ****Kitten ****is ****under ****new ****ownership.** A small wicked smirk spread across his face.


	3. Strange Occurances

**Strange Occurrences**

The sunlight poured in through the open curtains in the small bedroom. It creeped over the comforter onto a pale face. The warmth nudged her from her resting state. Jennifer sat up slowly, ruffling her hair with her fingers absentmindedly. She sighed and looked around the room. Another night of minimal sleep and the few eyes of closed eyes she did get were not restful in the least. She hated the room in the natural sunlight. The infernal ball of hydrogen always brought out the imperfections of her dwelling and truthfully her in general. Her reflection was messy and corpse like as she brushed her teeth. Her hair was down and all over the place, blonde layers sticking like spikes. She had large ugly bags under her eyes which were bloodshot and half lidded. She looked like a homeless dog and she knew it.

Wednesday mornings always hit the worst. It was the middle of the week where you couldn't get excited enough for the two days that had gone by but you also couldn't get excited for it being almost over because there were still several days to get through. Elaina crashed onto the couch and stared at the television that was already on. She vaguely remembered shutting it off before bed as she generally did but shrugged off the thought instantaneously. Oil in the ocean, Porn Star kills co-star, government making behind the scenes deals, and charity groups having ties with terrorists. She stared at the television with eyes of stone. The news stories never got any better these days. She knew she should feel horrible for everyone who was being affected by these stories but she just couldn't get herself to care.

The pendant her father had given her was lying on the couch-side table a few feet away and she was aware of its presence as though it were a person staring down her neck. The recipient was a good enough reason to get rid of the thing, but the eerie feeling it gave her was a bigger initiative. Yet, every time she went to go throw it away from intended to move it to a location where it was farther away from her she seemed to get a knee crippling headache. And the only thing that seemed to make it go away was having it back with her. But she intended to leave it home today. She didn't feel the need to drag such an obvious piece of jewelry around her neck just because of a small headache. This was probably only a coincidence anyway, seeing as she had headaches regularly.

Elaina made no turn for the kitchen as she gathered her things for the school day. The school year had only just begun and she was already up to her neck in responsibilities. Eight full hours of classes with no breaks or lunch periods and a part time job, it was a miracle if she ever got home before seven in the afternoon on a good day. Her father had taught her at a young age to keep herself busy; it refrains from allowing you to think all too much. That was how he had responded to her mother's death. Spend all of his time working and as little time at home as possible. She preferred it better that way. The doorknob burned as she went to close it and the headache began as she went to step out of the door. She leaned against the door as her knees threatened to give way from beneath her. Her mind pulled her back into the house, towards the pendant. She shook herself away; she knew it was just a coincidence. And yet as she fought with herself over it she walked back inside and grabbed the pendant.

The moment her hands touched the smooth cold metal the feeling came back. The slow burning in her veins. The headache receded almost instantly and her lungs filled with oxygen; she could finally breathe. She stared at the gold in her hands calmly, but they were trembling slightly. Even though holding the gold calmed her for a short time the feeling however began to change. Her heartbeat began to quicken to a staggering rate. It felt as though a hole had been punched through her chest. Everything felt so empty; like nothing would ever be complete again. The pendant was dropped into her bag and she shut and locked the door.

Fall was the most beautiful time of the year around this area. The walk into the city was one of most serene moments of her day. When the leaves on the trees were in shades of red and yellow. Everything was cold and empty. Calm and beautiful. Silence, one of the few true moments she ever got. The surrounding environment was so pretty she was able to forget her life, if even for only a few minutes.

The classroom was empty aside from a few people this early in the morning. She always seemed to get there much too early even though it seemed as she would be growing late every time she rushed out the door. Elaina rested in her seat in the back corner. She liked being able to see everything that was going on around her. It made her breathe just a tiny bit easier. Everything in the room was ancient; possibly even the desks were still the ones that were placed here when the building was built over 150 years ago. The desks were all scratched with various crude messages written on them.

She knew very few kids in the school personally, and the few that she did know more than the names of were never really her friends in the sense that they knew anything about her. Seto Kaiba was sitting tensely in his chair with nothing on the desk but a book. As she looked closer at the cover she realized the text was in German. She couldn't help but examine him a little more closely. His chestnut brown hair was steadily growing down into his cobalt blue eyes. She always explained them to be his best feature. They were bluer than any body of water she had ever witnessed. They were like some precious unknown gem that could only be found in some hard exotic rainforest in Africa. She could stare into them for hours. Not in a sexual sense, but only because the color of his were so stunningly beautiful and exotic she was afraid that it could be the last time she would ever see a color that pretty. He looked positively miniscule width wise in the school uniform. Her eyes traveled down to his stomach which seemed to have shrunk in diameter over the past summer. How could someone so small have lost weight? She wagered that he slept less than she did and ate even less. Seto Kaiba and she had always been in competition since she moved here a little more than a year before. He was always at the top of the class rank his second was never in any danger of taking that space from him. He was a teenage genius who ran his own company while holding a 4.0 GPA in the Advanced Diploma category. He was the embodiment of perfection and no one could touch him. That was until she happened to come along.

Elaina herself came from money just as he had. So obviously, she had all of the best tutors the world could offer. She was an only child of a self made billionaire and after her mother died he had only one person to concentrate his money on. By fourteen she was sitting on college seminars in Hong Kong and could speak four different languages. She was the top candidate for valedictorian of her high school class and held an all paid advanced acceptance into Harvard University. Yet, as her father would say as his biggest disappointment, she didn't hold the hard business etiquette that it would take to run the family business one day. She never had the drive to sit around behind a desk all day and boss people around. Especially one that was just handed to her after her father died. She had other dreams that she wanted to accomplish in her life, but her father would hear nothing of it. Seto made it his daily mission to beat her in everything that they did to keep his number one status in the school system. She kept a cool exterior whenever he asked her what she received on an important assignment and an even cooler one when he boasted at the rarity that he beat her. He could have his fifteen minutes of victory. When he graduated from high school he would work full time on his business as CEO of Kaiba Corporation while she would go off to college and leave him behind.

Her hand twitched and she suddenly had a strong urge. The pencil in her hand snapped and her teeth smashed together, nearly baring her fangs like a snarling wolf standing over some fresh meat. She felt the pulsing in Kaiba's heart and the only thing that ran through her mind was ending it. She wanted to jump across the desk and grasp his throat, stare into those stone cold eyes and watch the fear as she tore it out. She wanted to watch the light leave his eyes as he covered her in his blood as he slumped to the floor. And as quickly as the thought came it had gone. She let out a shaky breath and swallowed quickly. She had never had any thoughts like that before. She wasn't an angry person so why had she just now?

She watched in shock as everything just seemed to drown in darkness. She looked around as everyone just sat frozen in their chairs and faced the front of the room as if nothing was wrong. She looked out the window and the sun was bitch black, shining brightly in the sky as everything around her came back to her as if she were looking at a negative Polaroid. Suddenly, the students around her exploded into large chucks of ash. The desks melted into wax which seeped into the tile on the floor. She was all alone. A dark chuckled filled her ears as long ripping sounds filled through the air. Long thick gashes that looked like she cut herself with a machete replaced the scars on her arms and blood darker than black pooled onto the desk. Large armored scarabs poured out of the cuts in rows, swarming over her body.

"Elaina!" She looked up slowly, staring into the eyes of her Physics teacher. He had his hands on her shoulders and she settled back into her chair after taking a slow breath. "Donovan, it isn't like you to phase out in the middle of class. Please try to pay attention." He patted her quickly before walking to the front of the room and continuing his lecture. Her fingers dropped the pendant she was holding in her book bag, which she had no recollection of picking up and stared up to the front, attempting to make no contact with Mr. Kaiba who was watching her like a hawk.


	4. Cold Money

Natural light blended with artificial LCD on a sharp cold face. Seto Kaiba stared blankly into his company laptop for the seventh straight hour that evening. The morning sun was rising in the east and pouring its harsh rays into his eyes. He glared back at it for a moment, the massive sphere simulated everything high above him he wasn't able to reach yet, everything that was outshining him, but he was determined to win the ridiculous staring contest. Top of his To Do List for the Day: Concoct a plan to blow up the sun.

The sun was a massive ball of gases, three fourths of its mass made up of hydrogen, the rest mainly helium with trace amounts of iron, carbon, neon and oxygen. Hydrogen was a highly combustible element that broke down or reacted with most of the elements on the periodic table. Even if he could create a weapon that could destroy the hydrogen atoms, the sun was 109 times larger than the diameter of the Earth at its widest. It would have to be a compound that spread like a virus throughout the rest of the mass. Seemingly impossible, he knew in the back of his mind that he was doing nothing more than wasting his time, but he would spend hours on such a mundane task just to prove that he could do it. Then again, the sun itself was slowly fizzling up. In a few billion years the sun would combust on itself and he would win. Ha, sun, ha.

He returned to his computer screen, the small internal victory easing his blood pressure. He seemed to be worked up over the simplest things these days, one of them obviously being the fact the sun was rising. A calculus paper was minimized on his toolbar as he stared at some pi-charts indicating stocks held by himself and the stock of his corporation. His stocks had risen to unimaginable heights after the opening his chain of amusement parks throughout the world but it wasn't enough. His brain was hard at work concocting other ideas for public hype and investment price rises. He kept flicking back and forth between the two documents; it was obvious which one he would rather look at. His company had somewhat taken a backseat to his school work as of late. He never had to work this hard to keep his number one status in the class rank. He had planned to drop out of school and focus on his company when he turned eighteen in October. He had no need to complete his high school career; he was already CEO of a multi-billion dollar corporation that conducted business all over the world. Not completing his high school curriculum was not going to change any of that.

All of that changed when Elaina Havert transferred to Domino High School. She put thrill back into high school that he hadn't felt in a very long time except when he was facing Yuugi Motou in a game of Duel Monsters, a real challenge. She seemed to be his mirror image, she had the ability to complete some of the most problematic examples any subject could conceive in a matter of moments with what looked like very little effort. Within several weeks of her transfer she was top of the class rank and had pushed him down to second, a feat that had never been accomplished by anyone before. He eventually got his number one status back and made sure she knew about it, but he had to work to keep it that way. There was no way anyone was going to beat him in anything and he certainly was not going to drop out and give her the satisfaction of beating him.

Seto closed his laptop swiftly and shoved it onto the expansive oak desk to his left. He pushed the dark blue Egyptian cotton sheets off his long legs as his bare feet hit the white carpet. He stretched stiffly, his finger tips brushing the high ceiling. It was time he started another day. He wandered down the hall and into his younger brother's room. Mokuba Kaiba, sole heir to the throne of pure corporate domination, was nestled in his bed, curled over like a harmless kitten. His long spiky black hair was sticking out all over the place and he had the face of a slumbering angel. He was however not an angel to wake up. Seto knew he could have a butler do this tedious chore, but he wanted to be the one that Mokuba woke up to in the morning, not some unknown house hand. As a typical thirteen year old middle school student, waking Mokuba up was in league with wrestling a territorial grizzly bear. Seto shook his younger brother's shoulder slowly, praying to the gods that it would wake him up. The younger Kaiba grabbed onto Seto's dark silk pants and refused to let go. Cobalt eyes hit the ceiling as he pulled his brother out of bed and tossed him into the swimming pool sized bathtub and turned on the water.

"Seto!" Mokuba screamed and crawled away from the water in vein.

"Get up, Mokuba. It's time for school." Mokuba growled up slunk after his older brother and shut the door behind him. Seto retreated back into his room and pulled on his uniform and brushed his teeth. He took his coffee black as he sat at the table with the morning newspaper. He waved off the fruit platter one of the butlers offered him and read silently. The mansion on the hill was always silent in the early hours of the morning. The moment when the sun was barely up and the atmosphere was still a dim light blue was his favorite time of the day, however he had missed that due to the fact that he had a Calculus paper to finish. However, he was sure he would get another chance tomorrow. Seto never slept more than a few hours a night if at all these days. If he did sleep he was back awake and working by 4:30 am on the dot no matter how many sleeping pills his brother continued to slip him. Too many things ran through his mind at the end of the day so he couldn't get the restful R.E.M sleep he needed to feel recharged at the beginning of each day. He had stopped running on fumes years ago.

Mokuba waved goodbye ecstatically as he rushed out the door to catch the limo. Seto waved back slowly and continued on with the newspaper. The headlines generally meant nothing to him unless they were about his company flourishing or a rival dropping into the dust of his coattails. He was the center of the headlines more often than not these days, no mystical phenomena had taken place in town in a little more than two years and the tabloids had little to write about. He flipped casually to the business section, completely flipping past the death and destruction the main pages provided. He felt no need to read about the despair of others, other peoples suffering was of no direct consequence to him, and if it ever was he could lay down a stack of useless bills that he could replace in profit in a second and make it all brush under the carpet. He glanced down the stock pages taking quick mental notes of all the companies whose stocks he possessed, which ones were doing well and which ones were eligible for sale. He had to remember to look at his calendar and pencil in a meeting with his stock broker.

"The limo is ready for you Mr. Kaiba." The teenage billionaire folded the paper and took one last sip of his coffee as he strode across the marble floor. A butler handed him a long blue trench coat he wore for the fall months and his large silver briefcase. Two men in black suits opened the large front doors to his estate and beckoned him a good day. He barely nodded in recognition as he slipped into the limousine that drove him six blocks to the high school. His school laptop was out of the case and on his lap before his driver could shut his door. He ignored the beautiful scenery his mansion was built on and concentrated on the artificial light his Calculus paper provided him.

He was always the first student inside of the classroom. He intended this since the beginning of his freshman year. He could stay inside of his multi-million dollar mansion away from the cretins around him now, but he found it easier to keep his blood pressure low if he showed up and walked in with as little of his fellow classmates around as possible. He found that when the blue sea spread for him in the untimely event that he was late he found himself catching irritatingly unintelligible conversations that made him want to slit someone's throat with his Blue Eyes White Dragon Card, and he had come to close to that act one to many times for anyone's safety; especially with how on edge he was these days.

Elaina strolled in and sat down silently. His eyes looked up for a quick moment, stimulated by sudden movement in his upper right line of sight, then returned back to his book. Dietmar Dath, a German bestseller about the abolishment of the human race and the world now run by mutant animals. Not something anyone would expect him to be reading. He was heavily into fiction books, thought he had very little time to sit and enjoy them. They were his guilty pleasure, a time where he could sit back and pretend the world didn't exist around him and the unthinkable was possible if only for a few moment, and since the book was in full German text no one could make out what he was reading so they were able to think of him what they wanted without his image being soiled. He felt a soft pair of eyes resting on him and he glared at the centerfold of his book slightly. Elaina was staring at him.

Seto stiffened slightly and leaned back so he could look at her without averting his gaze from his book. If she was going to spy on him he would be damned as not to spy right back, only better. He scoffed at the generic school uniform that hung over her body like an ugly drape. A pink button up top that clung to every girl's body in the school, except for hers apparently was mixed with a large blue ribbon tied around the neck that attempted to camouflage the chest but did the job poorly if at all. The short blue skirts stopped much too high up the thighs and made every high school girl in the student body look like a color blind hooker. Jennifer's vest was two sizes to large for her body size. He wasn't sure if she had gotten it specifically like that or if that was what she looked like when she had arrived at the school but had just lost weight. Now that he sat and thought about it, his German novel long forgotten, she did seem to have dropped down to a dangerous weight class. Her skin was pale, pasty and ugly and was framed with hair snow white with shades of gold and amber throughout. The paleness of her hair brought out the paleness in her skin. The vest hung so low it covered almost all of her skirt, which didn't sink any lower than anyone else. She may have been able to fool everyone else, but not him. She was sick. Her eyes looked as though she slept about as much as he did, bloodshot and large though he was sure they would look bigger if they were ever more than half open. He smirked, it would be such a shame if she were to get sick and fall behind in the standings so soon.

He turned back to his book slowly and began to read. Elaina no longer held any interest for him. Let her stare all she wanted. Let her stare and realize she had bitten off more than she could chew messing with him. Let her stare at everything she wanted and wish she had in herself. The difference between her and him was that she might need him, but he would never need her for anything. She was just his play toy at the moment, his mediocre challenge of the month. She would break to pressure just like everyone else and he would continue on with his life and forget her in an instant. She would never forget him and he knew it. He snuck a glance over to see if she was still staring, she wasn't, however she was staring at the front of the room. She was clutching something inside of her bag and her eyes held nothing but fear. He perked up and followed her gaze. She was staring at the empty chalkboard. The teacher was talking but everything was muffled to him, he was so immersed in his thoughts he hadn't seen anyone walk in. The world was blurry to him; he was the only one who existed. She was shaking terribly now and looked as though she was on the verge of tears.

The instructor followed his gaze and walked over to Elaina, attempting to wake her from her daydream. She blinked and dropped whatever she was holding back into her bag and straightened up as though nothing had just happened. She professed that she was alright and apologized profusely and the professor continued on with his lesson. She put on a show that she was fine, but Seto Kaiba knew better than that. He watched her like a hawk over a kill other scavengers wanted.


	5. Connections

Elaina sat inside one of the broken down stalls of the high school girl's bathroom. A thin film covered the confines as an inch of water covered the floor. Several bulbs were cracked by bored juveniles and made the room loom in shadow. Tears streamed down her cheeks as her clasped hands trembled in her lap. She was terrified. Ever since her father had given her that damned thing she began to go mentally insane. She had even gone as far as to hallucinate in the middle of class.. None of these things had ever happened to her before and she had little to no explanation as to why they were happening now. She just didn't know what to do about it anymore. Only one thing was for certain. She had to get rid of the necklace. There was something on it, a toxin that was affecting brain function.

The white haired spirit inside the ring perked up as her thoughts clashed against the despair. Although he was enjoying her fear immensely, he could not allow this thought to come to pass. His new host had not been very grateful of his presence and had the nerve to want to get rid of her gift far to many times. It was time to show her that now there was no way out. She was moving. He pulled himself out of the ring. He stood in the bathroom and scuffed in disgust at his surroundings. The bottoms of his jeans were lined in murky water. He could have appeared in anything he wanted, but his previous hosts' clothing line had grown on him a little; though he would never admit it to anyone.

He could walk around without her seeing him. Even though he intended on scaring her he had no intention of revealing himself yet. There wasn't much more that he could do now. His mind games were working nicely, but they were not producing the results that he was looking for. He wanted to scare her to show his power, so the day they did meet face to face she would kneel before him like the God that he was. He however did not want to scare her into getting rid of the Ring. Although he didn't want to admit it, since he was only a spirit, he needed her to keep the Ring with her, he needed a body. He watched her like a lion watched a wounded zebra.

The spirit walked up behind her slowly, watching as she stood in front of the sinks and wiped the cool water produced by the faucet onto her face. He could feel what was happening in her heart, exactly what she was thinking. He could only feel her emotions at this point. His new host had yet to actually wear the Ring. When she did, she would be in for a big surprise. Only if she wore the Ring could he physically connect with her. Once she did that however, they would become one being. He would be with her at all times, know what she was thinking, feel the pain her body felt, know everything he wanted to know. At this point however, he could only guess what she was thinking, what she was feeling. At this point she could lie to him.

Elaina began to move again and he suspected that she was intending to go out the door and back to class. She reached into her bag suddenly and pulled out the Ring. He could feel the fingers on the Ring as if they were on his body. Long and warm against his chest and sides, but her hand was moving dangerously close to the trashcan beside the sinks. He glared sharply; he wasn't going to tolerate this anymore. She had to be taught a lesson, to never defy him again.

The prongs on the Sennen Ring, usually only used for detecting other Sennen Items, began to flow and came to life as though moved by strings, She gasped suddenly and went to drop the necklace into the garbage when the prongs turned on her and drove themselves into her hand. She screamed in agony as she attempted to pull them out feebly but the harder she tried to pull them out the deeper they dug into her skin. Several had driven themselves all the way through her palm and out through the back of her hand. Others were merely scratching feebly against her bones, attempting to dig deeper.

Elaina dropped to her knees, the large amount of pain experienced in such a short time had made her nauseous and she felt as though if she didn't sit down she was going to fall over anyway. Blood dripped from her wounds, over the shiny gold and mixed with the water on the floor. She cried, still trying to pull the thing out of her hand. She didn't know what else to do. She just sat there in the lonely, dark bathroom and cried, cradling her injured hand. She waited for the prongs to snap her bones but eventually, once she had stopped struggling with it, it stopped pushing. The prongs released themselves and the metal dropped to the floor with a loud clang.

The white haired spirit stood above her, staring down completely void of all emotions. He felt no sympathy for his new host. He watched as blood flowed freely from her now open wounds onto the watery stone as it swirled in an odd spiral that blood and water always seem to make. It was time that he stopped messing around. It was time for her to become his, to become part of him, for him to become part of her. He couldn't risk behavior like this again. Dark spirits from thousands of years of shadow games poured throughout the room. Spirits he himself had locked away in an eternity of shadow and despair were now doing his bidding. They crawled toward her slowly, pulling themselves up out of the tiled floor. He smirked at the ample amount of fear that was pouring through her eyes. Just put it on. He spoke softly into her ear. She still couldn't see him but she could hear him as long as he wanted her too. Just put on my Ring and all of this will go away. She was looking for someone, anyone that was around so that she knew that she wasn't going crazy. She was hearing voices now. One deep voice saying "put it on". The voice was terribly soft at first but it grew louder and louder until it was almost screaming.

"Stop it!" She screamed as she pulled the gold chain over her head. The chain was long and cold, the large pendant rested gently against her upper belly, starting just below her bust line. The voice stopped and the illusions went away. She sat there for a moment, waiting for something to happen. Then something did. A sharp pain went through her body like lightening; she was paralyzed on the floor. A crushing headache smashed into her like a tank. Flashes of images passed through her mind like a slide show in fast forward. Sand, pyramids, a spiky haired man in old Egyptian style clothing, Kaiba standing beside him, a man wearing the pendant, an old crypt, a large black monster. Her entire body ached suddenly and she screamed. It felt as though someone was stepping into her skin, someone who was far too large to fit. She felt her bones snap, her sockets pull apart, her skin tear apart. She laid there in the water; panting miserably. She couldn't move anything, it felt as though her entire body had just been lengthened to unimaginable proportions and her entire body was lead.

She wanted to just lay there forever, never having to move again, and she could just wait and pray for the wounds in her hand to bleed out so much that she passed out and died. She knew in the back of her head that that could never happen. There were no major arteries in the hand that could bleed out enough to kill her. Only possibility of that is if it hit the main vein in the wrist, which it didn't, it hadn't even torn her vest. The blood had washed off in the water and hadn't even stained the front of her shirt. She looked completely normal other than the fact that she was completely soaked on one side and had five holes in her hand. Explain the water on a trip and wrap up her hand she could walk out as if nothing was wrong. And that was exactly what she did. She pulled some of the cheap toilet paper from one of the stalls and wrapped it around her wounds until all that showed was white. A baggy sweatshirt was wrapped around her body. She was shivering and she didn't want to have to explain the large Egyptian centerpiece hanging around her neck.

Elaina ran her fingers through her hair, which seemed a bit paler than usual and clumped together like spikes. The long, warm sweatshirt was big enough to cover her entire uniform to where only a small portion of her skirt peeked out from underneath it and the sleeves were long enough to cover her hand if she was careful. Every time her heart beat she could feel the individual wounds throb painfully. She hurried out of the door so no one would see her. She nearly collided with someone as she shut the door. Her eyes met Seto Kaiba's and she nearly jumped out of her skin. Had he heard anything that had happened in there? He eyes her slowly, measuring her up, she could tell. It was a look he gave her quite often. He hadn't backed up since she had nearly collided with him, he probably thought it would be considered a weakness if he were to back away from her. However, he was making her uncomfortable standing so close so she elected to take a step back. Personally, she didn't particularly care what he thought of her.

"Finish that Calculus paper?" He crossed his arms over his chest and dropped his weight onto one of his legs. He was attempting to act casual, even civil, but this was how he worked when he wanted information. If she said yes he would continue to ask her questions until he was better than her in one of the answers, if she said no he would boast about how he had finished it and walk off. He was slightly intimidating with his stature compared to her, but nothing that she hadn't gotten over by now.

"Yes, fifty-two pages. How long was yours, if you even finished it yet that is." His eyes narrowed quickly before returning to its usual neutral to hatred state.

"Of course I finished it. And I'm sure you piled your paper with lengthened useless information. Unlike you, my assignments are based on substance." She smiled slowly. That was Kaiba's way of saying; screw you because your paper is longer than mine! She blinked as they stood there awkwardly. The bell had already run for the next class as she was writhing in pain on the floor it would seem, for the only reason Kaiba would come this way would be to go to the lobby for lunch. As one of the top students in the school they were both allowed a free pass out for their free periods. Kaiba usually left for lunch to one of those expensive restaurants, he was to good for school food.

"So, wanna go for lunch?" He stood there for a moment, blinking slowly, as though he had glitched out for a moment.

"In your dreams, Havert." And he walked off briskly, feeling confident for blowing her off. She smiled and shook her head before wandering down the opposite way. He was so easily manipulated at times. The white haired spirit appeared behind her, smirking maliciously. **You're certainly one to talk, little one.**


	6. Choices

Seto Kaiba walked briskly to the back side of the school with a confident smirk. He felt, once again untouchable as his driver opened his door and he climbed into the back of his black limousine. The cool familiarity of the metal of his laptop in his palms calmed him as he hastily began to type out his Calculus paper. He was sure to beat Jennifer in such a simple task as this. He began to mentally map out the rest of his days and the times he would have to complete the paper as he continued to type furiously.

The buildings passed by swiftly as he drove steadily toward his lunch destination. The only thing on his mind was Elaina and it was not about beating her in this school paper competition. Coming out of the Women's Restroom she looked wet and frightened. Was someone bullying her? Was a male classmate being too aggressive? He shook his head suddenly. Why did he care? She was nothing but something to occupy him while he sat in class for the next nine months. As if he cared anything about her personal life.

His lunch destination was a quiet café with good sandwiches and a dark atmosphere that kept him coming back daily. There were very few people inside as he strutted through the door. A waitress blushed and led him to his usual booth in the back corner of the room. She rushed off to fetch him a glass of water as he laid his laptop atop the wooden surface. A group of executives spoke quietly at the bar, gulping down cups of coffee that more than likely had shots of Gin hidden within the swirls of cream and sugar. People always stared but no one ever confronted him in this place. As the CEO of a multi-billion dollar gaming corporation, he was used to people staring at him. It was the human interaction that bothered him the most. He was supposed to hold gatherings and meetings on a regular basis but recently he had become more isolated and easily irritated.

The waitress laid a glass of iced water and a garden salad before him and he promptly ignored her as she rushed off to get his usual lunch menu item. A warm roast beef sandwich with extra lettuce and onions. His stomach growled in between the clacking of his keyboard and he blinked suddenly. Did he have any breakfast that morning? His eating habits had become atrocious in the preceding months. His company had been doing exceptionally well and he had needed to put more time in his school work than he wanted too. In previous years, he was able to put little time into his school work and still achieve top status. But now he had that irritating blonde to compete with and unlike him, she didn't have a company to run so she was able to put more time into her work than he. He snorted, even while running a company and taking care of his younger brother he had the ability to surpass her easily in the class rankings.

A horn broke him out of his thoughts and he looked out the window in irritation. What imbecile would keep their ride waiting so long that they needed to honk their horn in the middle of a quiet neighborhood? His black limousine sat alone on the side of street. He blinked and his eyes shot towards the small clock on the bottom of the screen. An hour had passed since he had sat down at the table. His sandwich lay inches from his fingertips, barely steaming from its time sitting unmoved from the plate. How was he constantly losing so much time? He gracefully stood and packed away his things and strode out the door. He continued to type, flustered at how much time he had wasted daydreaming in the café. The limo came to a screeching halt. They had been going slightly above the speed limit to be sure he arrived back to class on time. He closed his laptop and stepped out of the limo, choosing not to wait for his driver, he shut the door and moved quickly through the halls.

Elaina stood in the hallway extremely flustered and confused. Seto Kaiba had given her a quick breath of reality, something to focus on so she could ignore the problem at hand. But now he was gone, continuing on with his day, and she left alone. The metal against her skin continued to feel cool even though she felt like she was burning up. What had just happened to her? What was wrong with this cursed item?

"Elaina?" A familiar soft voice echoed against the linoleum walls as a petite blonde woman walked towards her quickly. Elaina wrapped her sweater tightly against her body and turned around. Mrs. Mitchell, one of the four in-school councilors was someone that Jennifer knew well. She was a woman who had always wanted to be a psychologist but had yet to finish school. So she pretended to be a shrink inside the school system until she got the required degrees. "Can you come to my office please?" She blinked. It wasn't natural to be called to the Guidance Office without prior knowledge. She began to worry, had someone seen her in the bathroom? Was she was in trouble for something entirely different? She sulked quietly behind her elder and closed the heavy wooden door behind her.

The office was small and cramped with two chairs opposite a large computer desk that was always covered in papers and post-it notes. Mrs. Mitchell was always forgetful and needed these visual reminders but they always ended up covered up and forgotten about either way. She sat down in the chair farthest away from the door and stared at the computer desktop absent mindedly. Hopefully this wouldn't take too long because she was hoping to get at least a little bit to eat before the lunch hour had run out.

"Hopefully I can make this quick. I was going through your records and it seems you have a credit missing." Elaina blinked. A credit missing? She had never been behind in any of her school work since the day she entered grade school. How was she suddenly missing a credit now?

"I'm sorry. There must be some kind of mistake. I've checked over my requirements many times. There can't possibly be a missing credit. I would have seen it surely." Elaina was praying that this was just a simple mistake. The last thing she needed was something like this. Mrs. Mitchell blinked and read over a paper in front of her quickly.

"It says here that you are currently missing one business credit that was not required in the diploma curriculum at your old school. As part of the International Baccalaureate program this school requires at least one credit in Business."

"Well then, can we just add it to the current schedule I already have? Perhaps over my lunch break?" She hoping it didn't have to come to that but if not eating for nine months meant graduating with a flawless record she would suffer through the weight loss.

"I'm sorry to say that none of the classes are offered during your lunch period."

"Then can we just move around my schedule to fit it in?"

"I'm afraid not. Sadly, you are intellectually gifted and many of the classes that you are required to take are only offered once a day in the times we have already allotted."

"So then what do we have to do? Summer school? Online schooling?"

"Business is not considered a core subject and is not offered during the summer and our budget is limited and we were forced to remove our online schooling program." Elaina was getting increasingly irritated. What exactly was she getting at?

"So what are we going to do?" Her mouth suddenly became a straight line and she fell silent for a few moments.

"Unfortunately Elaina, there isn't to much that we are able to do at this point. It is just one of those odd circumstances. We can free up your schedule so you have less to do this year and a little more to do next year."

"Next year? I'm not going to be here next year."

"Elaina… you cannot graduate this year without that credit. And there isn't a possible way to offer it to you at the present time. You're going to have to graduate next year." It felt as though Elaina's heart had dropped into her chest and her blood had run cold. There was no way she couldn't graduate this year. She needed to finish school.

"Please… is there anything that I can do?" She was desperate. Mrs. Mitchell blinked sadly. She hated to give false hope but she couldn't stand to see Elaina this way.

"You can try talking to Mr. Holleran before your next class but I'm not sure what good it will do you. When you have made a decision on your course load you can stop in and see me at anytime." Elaina stood up and excused herself quickly. She rushed down the hallway toward her Ancient Civilization class. Mr. Holleran, her history teacher also taught the one business class that was offered. Maybe he would have a solution to her problem. He was always one of the more in tune teachers she had met here. His hair was cut short and spiked; he always wore earrings and dark long sleeved shirts. He was sitting at his desk grading papers when she rushed in the door.

"Eli, you're quite early today. No need for such a rush." She leaned against the door to catch her breath.

"Mr. Holleran. I was wondering, is there a way to get into the business class that you teach?" He looked up from the pile of papers sitting on his desk.

"Isn't that around the same time you kids have your English Literature course? You know I only teach that during one period." Her shoulders slumped. It was exactly as she had expected. She walked over to her desk and sat down. "Why do you ask?" The door opened and Seto Kaiba walked into the room. She averted her eyes no longer wanting to answer the question. He looked at her and scoffed before taking his seat two desks away.

"I found out today that I can't graduate until I have that business credit." She flushed feeling embarrassed to admit such a simple thing around the teenage billionaire. Seto perked up from his laptop. What was this? Seto smirked and returned to his paper. Well, it was fun while it lasted.

"Well, Kaiba Corporation has an internship program that would cover that one business credit. And I'm sure you're more than qualified for the position. Isn't that right, Seto?" Kaiba blinked slowly. He was correct in that fact. He stole a glance and Elaina and she was looking at him. Behind those emotionless silver eyes was a tinge of pleading. His smirk seemed to be everlasting today. He was going to make her squirm, no reason to give her relieve so soon.

"I'll see what I can do." Mr. Holleran gave Seto a warning look which he promptly ignored and went about his paper. Elaina slumped down in her chair. Why would Seto Kaiba help her? He didn't even like her. She was going to be stuck in high school forever. The day continued on extremely swiftly for Seto, he finished his paper with much more time to spare than he had anticipated and he was able to leave early.

Seto Kaiba looked at the platinum etched clock sitting at the corner of his desk, it was quarter past eleven. He sighed and leaned back in his office chair stretching. He had not intended to stay in the office this late tonight. But he had started reading through a presentation he had prepared for his investors and lost all track of time. As he began to shut down his computer a sudden thought popped into his head. Elaina. He had completely forgotten about her request earlier that day. He sat and mulled over the possibilities for a few moments. He could simply deny her and be done with her forever. But that wouldn't exactly be in the spirit of things now would it? What harm could it possibly do to give her the simple credit? Then he could beat her admirably. He could not deny that she was extremely intelligent seemingly only surpassed by him. How badly could she mess up something as simple as the internship program? He sighed and wrote out a quick letter before turning off his computer. These next few months were bound to be interesting to say the least.

Elaina sat on her bed finishing up some Calculus homework when the Sennen Ring flashed dimly underneath her sweatshirt. The spirit stood in the corner looking at the fragile doll in front of him. She seemed immersed in her school work and no longer seemed frightened like she was earlier that day. He stalked towards her, stopping just inches from her bed. The Ring began to shake gently against her chest and she jumped nearly knocking the open books onto the floor. He smiled wickedly and sat down on the edge of the bed staring at her. Her hands were shaking as she began to get back to her work. She was convinced that she was merely imagining things. This was going to be interesting.


	7. Favors

Elaina crawled out of bed and was shaking furiously. She had had another dream about her mother. This one was worse than the others and was more than likely influenced by the events that had occurred the previous day. Her mother was lying in a pool of blood with puncture holes all over her body. She was reaching out for her, asking her why she didn't save her. Elaina tried to reach out to her but she was trapped within the gold pendant only peering out through the eye in the center. This was not a good way to start out a Friday.

She quickly dressed and rushed out the door. Her small apartment was beginning to feel less like a home and more like a tomb. The cool September air rushed onto her face and she felt a sudden sigh of relief. Maybe she would have to start doing her homework in the nearby park just to get out of the house. She quickly made it into the empty school and walked directly into her first period class without taking any detours. Seto Kaiba sat like stone in his seat a few feet away. Another grim reminder about how she wouldn't be graduating this year. As she walked closer to her usual seat there was a envelop lying on top of the desk. As she sat down she read the front.

Elaina Havert  
>486 Latil St., Apt 318<br>Domino City, California 17586

Kaiba Corporation  
>PO Box 18979<br>Domino City, California 17586

She blinked and opened the official looking letter.

"Dear Ms. Elaina Havert,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted into the Business and Economics Internship Program that Kaiba Corporation offers to Senior Domino High School attendees. This is an opportunity to demonstrate a keen eye for the business model that runs our country.

Please check-in at Kaiba Corps Main Headquarters today at 5 p.m.

Sincerely,

Seto Kaiba, CEO"

Elaina could not believe her eyes. Seto Kaiba had actually done something nice for someone. And that someone also happened to be her. She snuck a glance over at the tall teenager who was reading another German based novel. He made no move to look at her so she continued to read the letter several more times. She was worried that it would somehow disappear and it would all have been a day dream. But the letter was still there and it was not a dream. As she snuck into the hallway to make a quick phone call to her employer to let him know she would not be coming into work today, Kaiba looked up and smirked. He would see just how happy she remained when he worked her poor little fingers to the bone.

The day seemed to drag on forever for Elaina. For some odd reason she was extremely excited to begin her internship. Working for Seto Kaiba was a dream rarely accomplished by many high school girls but she did not see it this way. She needed this to graduate not just to have extra time alongside the billionaire bachelor. Not that she necessarily wanted to spend any more time with Kaiba than she needed too. He just happened to become her inadvertent ticket to her diploma. Now that she thought about it she never really understood why so much of the female population was so attracted to him. Yes, he was physically attractive, extremely intelligent and owned his own company at eighteen. But he was what most would call a jerk. He was known to care only about himself. She guessed it had to do with girls wanting a project. Maybe I could be the one to melt his frozen heart. She snorted what a thought.

The building was tall and shiny with many windows a lot of chrome. There had to be at least fifty stories in the Headquarters alone. The stone steps were guarded by two life sized Blue Eyes White Dragon statues. She knew little about the Duel Monsters card game that the company was based on but she did know that Kaiba's favorite card was in fact this large dragon and he owned the only three cards in the world. She smoothed down her skirt as she made her way inside the large glass doors. She had stayed inside the school and quickly finished part of her homework as she anxiously awaited the clock to near five. She felt extremely out of place as tall men in expensive suits talking on Blue-Tooth's rushed past her.

"Ms. Havert?" A small brunette wearing too much eyeliner called out from behind a desk in the center of the large foyer. "Mr. Kaiba is waiting for you on the top floor. Try not to keep him waiting." The brunette was eyeing her up jealously and she had no idea why. She quietly walked over to a steel elevator and pushed the glossy white arrow pointing upwards. She felt extremely uncomfortable already; she never did do very well in open crowded areas. The door opened smoothly and thankfully there was no one inside. She rushed in and closed the door before anyone could join her. She scanned the numbers and hit the highest number, 56, and sighed quietly as the elevator began to ascend. The elevator was clean and bright with rich blue carpet and chrome metal. She was beginning to see a pattern with Kaiba's interior designer. The elevator ride was somehow relaxing and she was sad to see it end. The doors opened and she stepped into a large hallway. There were no decorations on the wall and the same blue carpet lead to one single wooden door. A platinum plaque hung in the center of the door "Seto Kaiba, CEO". Elaina gingerly knocked on the door and took a step back.

"Come in." A gruff voice snapped from the other side of the door and she slowly turned the crystal handle and pushed the door open. The room was absolutely breath taking that she stopped closing the door just to take a look around. The carpet was snow white with flecks of blue and silver. The walls were a light blue but most were covered in awards or large bookcases. The north wall was not a wall, but a large pane of glass overlooking the entire city below. The fall sunset was beautiful and she desperately wanted to see if she could see her house from here. "Shut the door, I haven't got all day." Elaina jumped, honestly forgetting that Kaiba was even in the room with her. She shut the door quickly and turned back around. Kaiba was sitting behind a large cherry desk that was covered in computers. A desktop to his left with at least two monitors on either side and a laptop directly in front of him. There was a stack of papers in front of the left monitor that looked as though they hadn't been touched in ages. There were no chairs in sight as she walked up to the desk timidly. She was in his house now. He stared at her with those cold blue eyes for much longer than he needed too. He was trying to intimidate her.

"Seems as though you messed up pretty well this time, Havert." Elaina made no reply. It was obvious he was going to milk this for as long as possible and there was nothing she would be able to do about it. He smirked and continued typing as he spoke. "I don't feel the need to give you to difficult a task here since this company is too valuable for you to accidently forget about. You will be assigned to the treasury department where you will keep logs over the companies checking balance. This will not be your job solely for obvious reasons. We will have our internal mathematicians check over your work. If you can somehow manage to complete this task for the next nine months you will receive your credits." She nodded. His eyes sharpened as he looked up from his computer. "Report down to Steven Brace on floor twenty-seven," she nodded but stopped for a moment. He raised an eyebrow at her.

"Thank you very much." He smirked as she bowed her head.

"Try not to make me fire you." He wanted to make sure that she knew that she was under his thumb. He was her only ticket to her high school diploma. "Now get out of my office. I have work to do. I don't have time to babysit you all afternoon." She quickly rushed out of the room and down the hallway to the elevator. Earlier that day she was excited to start this new part of her life. Now she couldn't wait to finish each day that she was here. Less time to mess something up or to have Kaiba change his mind and take the program away from her.

Steven Brace was a small chubby man with thick round glasses and a pocket protector on the breast of his suit. He seemed oddly cheerful for someone who graduated from college to only deal with math all day. Elaina had never really liked math, it was extremely boring and tedious when a calculator could easily solve many of the problems presented. He showed her to the place where she would call home for the next several months. It was a small cramped area that looked like a closet with a desk in it. There were filing cabinets and metal bookcases filled with stacks of files ranging back to the years when Kaiba Corp was still a weapon manufacturing company.

"New paperwork will be filed into this room daily. You are to file it into the master check book that will receive every month. At the end of the month you will hand in the book and the papers that you received in order of date to be checked by my team and myself." Elaina nodded. She already had some plans running through her mind on how she wanted to conduct this task. He smiled and took her on a small tour through the rest of the key elements of the building. The cafeteria was stocked with more expensive cuisine than she could afford and she made a mental note to pick up microwavable dinners to bring to work. She had chosen to work the night shift which ranged from five to ten in the afternoon. Five hours per day was the minimum requirement to earn a salary alongside the high school credit and most of the interns were drop-outs or part time students. She however went to school full time and was seemingly going to lose more and more sleep. She was also going to have to quit her job at the local seafood restaurant in order to hold this position. But it was a reasonable price to pay in order to graduate.

"See you tomorrow at 5pm sharp. Don't be late!" He called as he closed the elevator door behind him. The air had gotten frigid in the late September night. There were no clouds in the sky so all of the warm air was floating away into the atmosphere. A familiar figure passed by her swiftly as Seto Kaiba made his way out the door and into his limo. He gave her no attention as set his briefcase into the backseat and climbed into the car. The windows were tinted and she could no longer see him as the driver closed the door behind him. This was going to be an interesting few months to say the very least and she made her way home in the frigid cold.


	8. Pain

The loud blast of music from Elaina stereo made her nearly fall out of bed the next Monday morning. She hit the snooze button and rolled back over. The mornings were starting to get colder and she no longer wanted to climb out of bed. The weekend had been full of homework and sleep and frightening Egyptian themed nightmares. She never used to have dreams of any kind but since she had come across this ancient pendent she had a nightmare every night. Some of them were about her mother and others were about events she had no attachments too. She was always in Ancient Egypt and there were giant duel monsters attacking each other. Maybe working at Kaiba Corp. was starting to get to her. Dreams were said to be the mid processing things that had happened recently that weren't thoroughly processed throughout the day.

The school hallways were as empty as they always seemed to be this early in the morning. She liked being there early to get away from the crowds. Large crowds always made her extremely nervous. Even though she knew it wasn't true, she believed that everyone was staring at her, judging her. Maybe she needed to work on her self esteem a little more. She pulled a cereal bar out of her backpack as she pulled open her locker door. She pulled out many of the extremely thick books and put them into the metal case. Having so many advanced classes meant that she wasn't able carry all of her books with her one a constant basis. As she began to take her English Literature book from her locker it suddenly slammed shut.

Heather Pultoney leaned against the lockers beside her drilling holes into her skull. Heather was what some would call the princess of the high school. She was incredibly beautiful with long red hair and glowing green eyes that seemed to go on forever. Her makeup and hair were always done perfectly and her nails always matched her purse. She was the head of the cheerleading squad and was always the queen of any dance that she was nominated for. She also, however, was a literal witch. All of the adults believed she was an angel but the student body knew better. She would lie, cheat and steal from anyone she believed had something of hers that she wanted. She needed to have the absolute best of everything and no one could have more than her. Elaina shrunk in her presence. She had somehow managed to stay out of her path so far but it seemed things have changed.

"Elaina, is it?" Elaina looked back simply without making a reply. It was like talking to a rabid bear. Any sudden movement would unleash her rage so it was simply best to just keep quiet.

"So word on the grapevine tells me that you were accepted into Kaiba Corp. internship program." Oh, had she forgotten to mention that Heather was also Seto Kaiba's largest and most vocal suitor? Even though many of the females in the student body wanted to attempt to pursuit Seto Kaiba's heart they did it at great risk. Not many publically professed their interest in Mr. Kaiba without paying some sort of price.

"Well?" Elaina nodded slowly. Heather snorted loudly.

"Well who knew you were such a little slut. Who did you sleep with to get that position? There's no way that _you _were more qualified for that position than me." This was the first time that Elaina had heard about Heather attempting to get into the internship seeing as she hadn't heard of the internship period before the other day. It seemed however that she had been denied and Elaina had been chosen over her. Was there only one spot open in this specific internship job? She began to wonder how many other people she had beaten out for the job and why, if that were the case, had Kaiba chosen her over people that may have spent months working on various applications?

"Oh, I see what it is." Heather looked at her slyly with flecks of anger. "You thought it would be smart to get into this program so that you could get closer to Seto. Is that it?"

"No…? I…"

"Don't stand there and lie to me. Everybody knows that you cheat on your assignments so you could beat Seto to get him to notice you and that didn't work so now you are trying this. Well let me tell you something. Seto will never be interested in a fat, ugly, stupid, useless, fidgety little slut like you. He deserves a real woman." Elaina backed off slightly. Even though she knew she shouldn't listen, Heathers words hit her like a ton of bricks. She never thought she was the ugliest person but she could use some makeup. And she would admit she could lose some weight but she never thought people actually saw her like that. And she thought she was her worst critic. She sneered but quickly wiped her face into a beautiful smile.

"Seto! How are you this morning?" Seto Kaiba was walking down the hallway behind them and stopped just shortly behind Elaina. He loomed over her essentially covering her in his shadow. She was usually irritated by his stature but she was, for once, happy to see him. Maybe Heather would follow him and leave her alone. He made no reply as he surveyed the scene before attempting to continue on. Elaina moved out of his way, backing herself into the lockers.

"Seto, I applied to your company's prestigious internship program. Elaina was telling me that she was accepted and was wondering when I would be receiving my acceptance letter?" He looked over Heather as if attempting to remember her name.

"Heather, you were not accepted into the internship program. Your denial letter should have explained that to you. If you have any questions you are welcome to waste my secretary's time but please refrain from wasting anymore of mine." Kaiba looked over the red hair of Heather to look one more time at Elaina before walking off without another word. Elaina blushed as his trench coat tails brushed against her leg and the smell of his spicy cologne filled her nose. She was confused at her sudden reaction to him; she obviously needed some more sleep. Heather let out a deep feral growl and landed a large shove into Elaina's stomach. She slammed her head against the lockers as her backpack slammed to the ground. Her head was pounding and her vision was swimming as she slid slowly to the floor.

"That will hopefully teach you not to mess with me. Stupid slut." Heather kicked the backpack, sending its content scattered all over the floor as she marched down the corridor and out of sight. Elaina sat on the floor for a moment attempting to get her vision to return to normal. Tears flowed down her cheeks freely and she wasn't sure if she was crying from the pain in her head or the pain in her heart. She had an extremely high pain threshold and she wasn't used to crying in public. But the tears wouldn't stop as she feebly attempted to gather her things.

The spirit of the ring stood in the middle of the hallway beside his house with a soft flash. He stared down the hallway with intent as his host sat pitifully on the floor. He couldn't have his host be a quivering labia forever and he certainly couldn't have others thinking she was. The last thing he needed was deal with another host that couldn't stand up for themselves. The omnipotent crying was beginning to get on his nerves. He slipped inside her body as she fell unconscious. Until he revealed himself to her there was no way for her to remain awake and alert while he took control of her body. One of the unfortunate limitations of the souls link and the Sennen Ring. It would be quite interesting to experience the fear of a host as he took control of their bodies. But alas it was a dream he would never get to experience. He felt cramped inside her small body. He was used to take long strides and seeing the world from a much higher place but this body would have to do for now. He looked around and continued down the hallway in the direction the irritating red head had gone off too.

A door on the left hand side of the hallways with a blue sign painted with a vague outline of a female lead him to believe it was some sort of bathroom. He snorted as he stalked inside. He knew little about the modern human world he had been thrust into. But seeing as this place was similar he had demonstrated his powers to his host it was something familiar to him. As he had suspected the red head was standing in front of a reflective surface applying a thick dark substance around her eyes. He scoffed. They were not in ancient Egypt where the dark reflective charcoal was used to keep the sun from their eyes. By the time she had finished she looked nothing more than a raccoon. She spun around and the Spirit of the Ring shut the door behind him.

"What are you doing here?" The Spirit smiled through Elaina's lips and stalked towards his newest victim. Heather blinked; this wasn't the usual meek and feeble Elaina she was used too. The Spirit reached out and grabbed a handful of her long red hair and forcefully slammed her face into the side of the sink. She crashed to the floor as blood poured down her face and mixed with the thick plastic she had applied to her face. He was significantly satisfied with the damage and snickered.

"Maybe that will teach you not to mess with me." And the spirit turned and walked out the door leaving the witch to lay on the floor bleeding. He smiled and released his sleeping host and returned to the ring. Elaina blinked slowly as she took in her surroundings. How in the world did she get outside the girls bathroom. Her tears had dried and she felt a odd aching in her bones. She shook off the feeling and scurried down the hallway to pick up her books. She wanted to continue hiding and continue crying. But she had class to attend and she was already behind. She quickly smoothed out the black suit she had brought with her and hung it up in the small metal locker. She felt much to odd wearing her skimpy school uniform in the large corporation so she decided to find one of the many suits she wore as a teenager. She hadn't grown much and had even lost weight so they still fit. Blending in was the first step to becoming invisible in those vast halls.

Seto Kaiba walked briskly through the hallways on his way to class. He stopped just outside the door as a strange feeling over took him. Heather Pultoney was known to be a little aggressive when it came to him. He personally found it overly annoying seeing as he had absolutely no interest in the brainless red head. He could take care of himself, obviously, but Elaina was a different story. She was rather defenseless and was the epitome of brains over brawn. Would she be able to handle herself if Heather attempted to scare her out of the internship? He shook his head and continued through the door. What did he care? Either outcome worked in his favor. Either she would be scared out of the internship and not be able to graduate or she would be worked so hard in the program that she would not be able to keep up with her school work and ultimately fall behind him.

Elaina walked into the room and closed the door. She looked extremely shaken and her eyes were more red and puffier than usual. Had she been crying? He snorted and went back to his book without giving her another glance. She quickly slid into her seat and didn't say a word. The day continued on for her as it normally would and Heather was in none of the classes they shared together that day. She was extremely confused by that simple observation but wrote it off as her skipping class to go to the mall or whatever it was that popular attractive girls did.

The small cramped closet that she called an office at Kaiba Corp was strangely comforting to her. She liked being alone. She had never been the popular beautiful female that her mother had been. It was always a quality she and her father wished she had in herself. Her mother was always the life of her father's get togethers. She could float between many diverse groups of people and easily switch languages at her leisure. Elaina always had her nose stuck in a book as a child. She always his behind her mother's long colorful skirts at these parties. And as a teenager she was never the popular girl her mother was. She was never anything like her mother and it was something that her father would remind her of every day until she was dead.

Organization was always something that kept her mind off of things. She had a mild form of OCD and piles of miscellaneous items like Chex Mix made her want to separate the piles into peanuts, pretzels, raisins and M&Ms. As a child she would separate M&Ms by the colors or her animal crackers based on species. There was never any reason to do such things as children's brains are generally very unorganized but she always needed to do it. It developed into needing to color code school subject notes from the color binder used down to the ink of the pen she took notes with. The books in her apartment were sorted in Alphabetical order after first being separated by subject matter.

She had taken initiative with the work that had been given to her. Math was a boring subject but business finances were always something that she had been exposed to at an early age. She began to separate the different types of spending coming in by colors. She then used colored thin post-it notes to separate the master book she had been given and began to write down each in a separate book that she brought home every night so that she could double and trip check the math before going to bed. She would never give Kaiba a reason to remove her from the program.

As she began her treck home she felt a sudden surge of emptiness that hadn't been felt in years. She felt as though there really was no reason to continue living. She didn't know why she suddenly felt this way. She hadn't felt this way since she was old enough to wish she had he mother with her. She hadn't felt this way since she was a teenager. But the feeling was stronger than ever as she made her way though the dark streets. She quickly locked the door to her apartment and rush into her room. Underneath her bed was a loose floorboard with a false bottom that she had made many years ago. Inside was a small jewelry box that held something other than jewelry. Inside was an assortment of razorblades she had collected from various places, a small bottle of rubbing alcohol and some medical gauze. She hadn't opened this box in many years but it felt natural.

Elaina shrugged off her suit jacket and revealed her scars. Bother of her arms were covered from elbow to wrist in thin white lines from many years ago. A very dark place she never thought she would return to. But the entire day she had felt useless, like there was no reason to live anymore. She picked up one of the razorblades with shaking fingers.

The Spirit of the Ring stood in the doorway watching his host with a confused gaze. She was sitting atop her bed crying meekly while rummaging through a box of sharp objects and mending supplies. What she was doing was lost to him as he leaned against the wooden frame. Whatever she was doing it was of no interest to him at the moment. He was thinking about the blood dripping down the red heads face earlier that day. He had done what had needed to be done and he felt no remorse for his actions. As if he needed too. He looked out the open window and spotted a gorgeous full moon. His lids lowered as he thought about his old home. He missed Egypt and the simplicity that it brought. There was no confusing buildings or clothing choices. When you wanted something to eat you found your weapon of choice and went out and killed something. When you needed sexual release you took one of the many wonton chambermaids in any of the nearby temples and had your way with them. He smirked as he quietly went through his many sexual encounters with the Pharaoh's women. There always something about abduction in the dark that turn promiscuous women on.

His eyes shifted back to his host wondering what she was up to now. Blood dripped onto the bed sheets as the sharp object slid into the meat of her wrist. His eyes widened. She was attempting to end her life. He could not let this happen. If the owner of the Sennen Ring died while their souls were linked then his soul would die with her. He had to stop her and there was only one thing that came to mind. He had to reveal himself to interact with the outside world. The Ring flashed and he strode across the room and slapped the items from her hands. The contents of the box scattered across the wooden floor and she stared at him with large silver eyes.

A tall man in ancient garb stood before her stood before her in all of his glory. He had long white hair that hung in spikes over his shoulders. His eyes were a bewitching violet and filled with malice and evil. A long scar trailed from his eye to his cheek and had other scars crossing through it. His skin was warm with an eternal tan from the Egyptian sun and we dressed in a long red coat mixed with white cloth and gold chains. He crossed his arms over his bare chest as he shifted in his sandals.

"Now now, I can't have you ending things so soon. Not when we haven't even become acquainted yet." She cowered against the wall. The voice sounded just like the voice she had heard in the bathroom when the pendant had attacked her.

"Who are you?" She tried to stop her voice from shaking but she was scared. She had never had a boy in her room before and she was confused as to how this strangely dressed man had even gotten into her apartment. He stepped forward slowly and she cringed. She had no way of protecting herself and even if she did she doubted she had the ability to. He stopped at the edge of the bed and kneeled. His weight made her lean towards him slightly and he moved closer. He placed his hand on either side of her and leaned so close that their noses nearly touched. He smirked and touched the Ring underneath her shirt.

"I am the Spirit of the Sennen Ring. You can call me Thief King or Touzoku-ou Bakura, whichever your lips prefer." He smirked at her obvious fear as he ran his finger along the edge of her bottom lip as he leaned backwards. "I can't have you killing yourself, little one. If you die then I will die and that is something that I did not have in my plans for today."

"What are you talking about…"

"You and I are linked through this," he grasped the thin chain, brushing the skin of her chest, and he pulled the pendant from under her shirt. He ran his thumb over the eye of the pendant before resting it onto her stomach. "And if the owner of my Ring dies while they are carrying it then I die as well. Seems pretty simple when you take a moment to think about it. I was under the assumption that you were intelligent." She stared at this odd man. What on Earth did he mean that he was a Spirit bound to the necklace that her father had given her? She didn't even believe in the supernatural. The man snickered softly.

"It would be in your best interest to believe. It makes things between us a lot easier if you believe that I am real." Her eyes grew large like saucers and he threw his head back and laughed loudly.

"Yes, as I said previously explained, we are linked. I can hear you thoughts, I can feel your fear." He smiled at her knowingly.

"Well, could you maybe just go away?" He snickered.

"I didn't choose to come into your possession. I was sent to you so until you return me to my resting place then we are stuck together. I cannot just simply go away as you colorfully put it."

"And where exactly is your resting place?"

"The stone that holds the Sennen Items is in a temple in Egypt." She wasn't exactly sure how she was expected to deal with this obvious mental hospital patient. She hadn't remembered hearing anything on the news earlier about an escapee. She would have to check in the next day. What she was worried about now was how to get him out of here.

"Well, then I will have your Ring returned to its rightful owner. I know a few people in Egypt that could find the tomb you're looking for." The man smiled at her.

"If you wish to return the necklace to Egypt and rid yourself of me that is your own prerogative. But you yourself must be the one that takes on this task. You could not even make it out of your dwelling without me. What makes you think you will survive sending it across the country? Your hands must touch the stone as you return my necklace to it's stone." She blinked slowly not buying a single thing this man was saying.

"So stubborn. You're just like him know. Didn't believe until the very end." He took a step backwards. "Well then, I will just have to make you believe then won't I?" The pendant around her neck flashed and that similar aching feeling filled her bones. She stood up without wanting too. She had no control over her body as she gathered the things from the floor and returned them to the box. "I am in control of our body. This body is no longer only yours. I am always with you. This body is now also mine. You are a host for me to use at my slightest whim." She returned the box underneath the bed and sat back down on it. She suddenly regained control as the man returned to his perch in the doorway.

"I'm no trick. What you are experiencing is real and it will work best for the both of us if you just accept it." She had nothing to say. There was no way she could explain the things she had just experienced. Had she honestly come into contact with a ghost?

"Now now, there is no need to worry about such things. I am not a ghost I assure you. I am merely a five thousand year old spirit locked away in an ancient Egyptian artifact. That's not too hard to believe now is it?" He smiled at her. "Now be a good girl and take care of our body for us. Dying is not a good way of accomplishing that goal."


	9. Empty Mature Content

**The following chapter contains mature content not suitable for some readers. Viewer discretion is advised.**

* * *

><p>Elaina had hardly gotten any sleep that night. The strange man had simply disappeared in front of her eyes and she was worried he would suddenly return in the middle of the night. She no longer felt as safe in her own apartment as she once had. But she knew she no longer wanted the necklace with her. The Spirit of the Ring perked up at this sudden rebellious thought. He thought about how exactly he wanted to deal with this for a moment. He could simply take control of her body and force her to take the Ring with her. But she wanted to teach her an even larger lesson. And making her return on her own was more satisfying than forcing her. Even though the former was much easier.<p>

Elaina quickly packed her things as she passed by the open box of cereal bars without a second thought. She was much too fidgety this morning to eat and she wasn't hungry anyway. She pushed her books into her bag and hurried out the door. She didn't believe a thing that Spirit was telling her. She could easily survive without that stupid necklace. As she headed down the stairs her head began to pound. Her knees began to buckle and she grabbed the guard rail to stop from falling down the entire flight of stairs. Every beat of her heart sent a pulsing wave of pain through her head. She slowly began to traverse down the rest of the stairs. She would be damned if she couldn't make it through a day with a little migraine.

Bakura sat on the moth eaten couch quietly. He could faintly feel the pulse pounding headache his host was experiencing. This was only the beginning of symptoms she would feel before long. Soon she would become physically sick and begin to sweat and shake. The door opened and his host stumbled inside breathing heavily. She leaped towards the table and pulled the necklace over her head. She looked at the dark man with discontempt as he smiled innocently. He disappeared inside the ring with a flash. The darkness of the Ring was a sudden comfort now that his host was now once again carrying him with her. Even though he had always hated it, he needed someone to survive and when they left him he became weak as well. There was little he could do when his host was not wearing the Ring. He could not interact with the outside world and his exploration range was limited. But when someone was holding his Ring his power was almost limitless.

Elaina quickly took her seat as her hands continued to shake. She averted her eyes from Kaiba and just stared down at her desk. The last thing she needed was for him to think she was acting any weirder than he already did. The door swung open angrily and Heather Pultoney stomped through the door. Elaina stole a glance at the door and nearly jumped out of her chair when she saw Heather. Her nose was covered in a plastic cast with her cheekbones wrapped in hospital gauze. What had happened to her? Heather refrained from looking at her as she sat down in her usually seat surrounded by her pack.

"Oh, Heather, what happened to you!" One of her blonde friends shrieked. Kaiba's eye twitched suddenly. Why couldn't all girls be as quiet as Elaina in public?

"Someone pushed me into the bathroom sink. Broke my nose and cracked my skull in several places. I thought my brain was going to start falling out of my head and I was going to die!" Bakura appeared on the windowsill beside her. She stared at him in surprise, desperately wanting him to go away before anyone could see him.

"Oh calm yourself, Kitten. No one can see me other than you." She blinked and sunk into her chair. That was a relief, the last thing she needed was for everyone to have physical proof that she was crazy. He looked over at Heather and snickered quietly. Elaina looked at him oddly. Why was he so giddy about seeing Heather hurt? She began to think about the last time she saw Heather. She had pushed her into a locker and the next thing that she could remember she was suddenly standing outside of the girls' bathroom. And the only places in the school that held sinks that were accessible to students were the bathrooms.

"Starting to catch on are you? Not so dumb after all." She looked at him in fear.

"Please don't hurt people!" The Spirit laughed loudly.

"I shall do whatever I please. You fail to realize you are not in control of the situation here. The control belongs to me." She looked at him sadly but had nothing to say. He was obviously not a man of reason. He looked at her quizzically. What did she care what happened to that woman. She had physically attacked her just the other day. Why she was not angry let alone defending her? He snorted, why did he always seem to get the goodie two shoes hosts?

Mr. Brace looked over Elaina's shoulder as she quietly sorted through the piles of papers that had been sent to her in the last hour. She was extremely organized and the checking he had so far done revealed that her math was absolutely perfect. The internship program was generally for students who generally needed all the help that they get in their school work. Seto Kaiba generally gave these positions to ones he was sure would fail. It was his way of aiding to natural selection. So why had he given this position to this obviously intellectually gifted young lady? She may have had odd fashion choices she did her work silently and well.

Seto Kaiba sat in his empty office stories above quietly typing out a letter to the investors that would be arriving at his doorstep within the week. An email notification appeared in the corner of his screen. He had gotten many in the past several hours and he was more than ready to promptly ignore it so he could continue on with his work that is until he read the subject line.

**Subject: Elaina Havert Report**

He sighed overly annoyed. What had the little squirt done this time? Had she already done something to get herself fired? It was something he didn't exactly feel like dealing with but he was the one who went against his normal rules to bring her here. She was now his responsibility. He opened the e-mail and scanned over it quickly. This was something he was not exactly expecting. Absolute praise from Brace. Even though he seemed to be an overly sweet fellow he had a vicious passion for his job and was more than willing to throw people under the preverbal bus for the simplest mistake. It wasn't very often that he had anything nice to say about anyone in his same position above or below him. It was obvious that he was the only one allowed to look good in the eyes of CEO in the Accounting department. Kaiba leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling fan spinning widely overhead. Maybe he had made the right decision overall. What was he saying he always made the correct business decisions?

Elaina pushed the door open and with all her might stopped herself from collapsing on the nearby couch. She was absolutely exhausted. She had stayed far too long in her office attempting to finish all of the paperwork she had been given that day. She was not required to finish such a large workload but the sight of those papers sitting in her office bothered her. By the time she had finished the only bodies left in the building were the late night janitors that cleaned the building spotless for the next business day. Even Seto Kaiba had left before she had which was an extremely rare occurrence. She was absolutely exhausted and she still had all of her homework to do. Each of her classes always piled work onto them in preparation for college. She wanted desperately to have a long nights sleep for the first time in a long time but knew she could not fall behind on her school work.

She climbed into bed and tried her hardest not to lay down as she pulled off her suit and into her pajamas. They were extremely comfortable and would feel even better underneath the heavy covers of her warm bed. The end of September was nearing and the nights were starting to get colder with each passing day. Bakura loomed in the shadows silently. He had just watched as his host had undressed and his core seemed to rise in temperature. His limbs became heavy as he watched her slowly crawl back onto the bed and reach for her belongings. He snickered loudly as he slipped into her body. It had been a very long time since he had experienced sexual tension but there was a high amount of it tonight. She froze suddenly no longer in control of her actions.

"Bakura, what are you doing this time? I don't have time for this right now. I need to finish my homework." He snickered through her mind.

"Just lie back and try to enjoy yourself. We're going to try a little bonding exercise." He pushed her off of the bed and faced the only mirror the entire house held. Slowly he pulled the long sleeved shirt over her head. Her skin was deathly pale and shimmered in the moonlight coming in from the windows. Her long snow white hair tickled her shoulders and he ran her fingers through it. Her hair was soft and shiny but stuck up in odd places when he took control of her body. Her breasts fit perfectly in her hands as he ran her fingers over her nipples. Elaina shrieked in his thoughts and he frowned.

"What are you doing? Stop!" This was going to be more difficult to enjoy if she was talking.

"Try to keep quiet, Kitten. I'm doing this for the both of us. It's been nearly five thousand years for me and you need some stress relief. Now cease speaking or I shall make you." He slid her hands down her sides feeling the soft skin of her belly. She was incredibly skinny and could use some nutrition before her ribs began to poke through her skin. He began to peel her bottoms from her hips when she began to beg again.

"Oh will you stop. We share a body. Do you really believe that seeing you without clothing will be a rare occurrence for me? You don't expect me to keep my distance until you decide to return me now do you?" When she began to protest he had had enough. Suddenly his mind became silent. She needed to learn that he was in control. She could still see and feel everything that was occurring but she no longer had a vocal link to him. Cloth hit the wooden floor and she was completely revealed to him.

"Oh, what is this? Not as innocent as you like people to believe now are we?" She was completely free of hair and was smooth to the touch as he brushed her fingers below her belly button. Tears filled her eyes as he continued to stare into the mirror.

"Oh come now. There's no need to be like that, little one. There will be no reason to cry as soon as I'm finished. So there is no need to start now." He turned off the lights. He had had enough of the show he was ready to get down to business. There were candles scattered all over the room that he lit at his leisure. They all seemed to hold the same scent; Vanilla. As he laid her onto the bed the soft glow of the candles gave her skin a darker hue as if kissed by the sun and this simple sight aroused him to the deepest meaning of the word.

He ran the tips of her nails gently over her stomach causing her skin to raise goose bumps and her nipples to instantly harden. He licked the tips of her fingers and rubbed the hardened tips gently. He had been known in his past time to pleasure a woman to an overwhelming degree when he was in the right mood. However, he had never attempted to pleasure a woman with her own body and it was having an interesting affect. Even though her true mind knew that she wasn't the one in control, her body was feeling as though she was pleasuring herself. Even though her true mind didn't seem to want it her body surely did. Both of them were feeling the effects of his techniques. Her bodies release meant his release as well. A simple way of mixing masturbation while still interacting with a female. Interesting to say the least.

He continued running her nails along her skin as her reached lower and her body twitched slightly. He snickered, how adorable. By now she must have realized that he could no longer hear her and she was no attempting to gain control of her body. Cute but futile. She did not have the inner will to oppose him no matter how much she wanted too. He rubbed the entrance folds gently eliciting a shiver from her muscles and an ache in her stomach. Her body wanted more, much more. And he planned to oblige; for the both of them. He spread her and brushed against her clit gently. Her thighs twitched and he smirked. She was incredibly sensitive on this specific bundle of nerves. He continued to explore, it was like a game, could he find all the sweet spots that made her tummy twitch and beg for more. He ran along the slick insides around her entrance. He wanted to get to the point where her body was shaking until he continued. He continued to rub the sensitive spots while tracing circles around the extremely tight hole he had discovered.

How long had it been since she had pleasured herself? In the many days he had now been attached to her he could not think of a time where he had been awoken from the bowels of the Sennen Ring to the sound her letting out moans of pleasure. He had however been awoken, rather annoyed, by the sounds of her pitiful tears created by her recurring nightmares. He quickly wiped the thought away as he finally felt she was ready. He pressed one finger inside of her and let out a small hiss of surprise. She was incredibly tight as if nothing had entered her in a very long time if ever at all. He would be sure to pester her for this information later but now there was little on his mind. Not willing to wait he pressed in a second finger with some difficulty. Her body was rejecting entry and was attempting to push him out which only made for a tightly grip. He brought down a second hand to slowly rub her sensitive areas as he found a rhythm that suited his mood. Her fingers became slick as he continued to push them deeper with every entry. She was slowly beginning to stop resisting him and he felt it was safe to relink them. Slow high pitched whines filled his thoughts and he nearly released on the spot.

She didn't moan or scream, she whimpered. Low and rythmatic she let out a whimper every time he pushed her fingers inside. He was silent as he continued; only listening to the sounds in his head and feelings in her body. As he came to a finish a long breathy moan filled his ears as a long sigh of relief filled her body and she released. He let out a long sigh as he let her arms fall to her sides. He felt completely satisfied, if not a bit sleepy as he laid there in the candle light.

"Now, that wasn't so bad now was it? You seemed to enjoy it." She said nothing in return and he smiled. He hoped he hadn't broken her so easily. There would be no fun if that was all it took. After a moment he released her and returned back to the Sennen Ring to sleep. He was in an oddly content mood and it was best to rest when this occurred. She laid in the dark silent. Tears filled her eyes as her emotions were conflicted. She hadn't wanted it but she had enjoyed it. She felt violated.


	10. Redemption

Elaina awoke to the bright sun shining in her eyes and she groaned. She rolled over and jumped as she felt the sheets brush against her bare skin. The memories of the previous night washed over and she wanted to crawl under the covers and hide. But she knew she couldn't do that. She had to get out of bed and go to school. School was important and no matter how badly she was feeling she needed to attend. She pulled on her school uniform and looked over at the clock and nearly jumped out of her skin. School started in ten minutes, she was late! She usually set her alarm right before bed but for obvious reasons she had forgotten.

"Thanks a lot." She muttered as she gathered her backpack and ran out the door. The Spirit awoke from his slumber as he heard his host speak directly to him.

"Well, you are welcome."

"You don't understand sarcasm very well do you?"

"Not at all." He smiled at her innocently. "Why in such a rush?"

"Your little fiasco last night made me forget to set my alarm and now I'm late."

"Thinking about me?" She nearly tripped but regained her composure.

"Wouldn't you know? You said you could hear everything I was thinking." He laughed.

"Witty. I can stop having personal interaction with you and just learn everything I want to know. But what fun would that be? You liked what I did last night. I heard it for myself. So stop denying it." She chose not to reply. She was still trying to figure that part out and she didn't have time to do so at the moment. She nearly slid into the classroom right on the bell and blushed as everyone in the room looked at her.

"Nice of you to show up, Elaina. Even if a tad later than usual. Please take your seat." She nodded without replying and quickly took her usual seat in the back corner near the windows. Seto was eyeing her and she tried her best to pretend like she didn't notice. Why did she always seem to look the worst when he was around? "Time to hand in last night's assignment." Her jaw nearly hit her desk. She hadn't finished any of her homework last night either. She wanted to hide underneath the desk as the instructor made his way down the line of students. She had never not completed an assignment before in her entire school career. She wanted to slap herself, she couldn't let her personal life problems interfere with her schooling no matter how supernatural or awkward they might be. The teacher outstretched his hand awaiting her to hand in her work.

"I don't have my work, sir." She said quietly. He gave her a stern look before turning to take someone else's outstretched papers.

"Late and without your work. I am disappointed in you, Elaina." Her shoulders slumped. That was the worst thing you could say to someone you were not happy with. Yelling was something she could take but disappointment was something she couldn't. Seto Kaiba smirked in her direction as he handed in his work. His plan was working perfectly already. He was well aware she was one of the last to leave the Kaiba Corp offices last night. She must have gone home and slept and left her work by the wayside. **Too bad.**

Elaina dropped her bag on the floor near her desk. It had been a long day of embarrassment. She had none of her work to hand in and a handful of surprised teachers to answer to. It seemed Kaiba would have a permanent smirk on his face for the day. She was surprised he hadn't stopped her to rub it in her face. For that she was extremely grateful. She pulled the Master Accounting book from inside of her desk and blinked. The color coded post-it notes had been moved as if placed several pages forward.

She flipped to the Purple marker indicating the last second she had completed and it was merely an empty sheet. She had placed the purple marker for Advertisements. She flipped to the front and checked every page. Everything had been in order until she arrived at the Green section. Green was for personnel expenses such as Business Credit Card spending when on a business trip. The pages were all missing. The green marker was now paired with the blue inked Building Expenses and the blue marker was placed over the purple inked Advertisements. Had someone been in her office moving around the items in the book?

She pulled the backup book she kept in her backpack and looked over it. It was more than likely illegal to have public records of a company's spending without the permission of the owner so she kept the book on her person instead of leaving it in the office. There was a good $50,000 unaccounted for in the Company Personnel Spending. Most of the charges were made on a company credit card 0567-322. She turned on the expensive computer that she rarely used seeing as it was probably worth more than the yearly rent her apartment summed up too and she didn't want to have it spontaneously combust under her watch. She opened the Kaiba Corp financial data base and looked up the credit card number. It was last issued to a man named Herbert Stanton who was terminated from the company shortly after he returned. The card was reportedly turned into Steven Brace.

The door opened and she quickly dropped the book into her bag. Steven Brace walked through the door with his usual happy smile. Her heart was pounding at the thought of being caught before she could get this information to Kaiba.

"How is everything going?" He gave her a pointed look. Was he trying to figure out if she had discovered what he had done?

"Very well. I'm almost finished." She had never been a very good liar but she prayed that it would be enough this time. He nodded, content, and closed the door behind him. She let out a sigh of relief and shut down the computer after printing out the needed pages. She needed to get this to Kaiba straight away. She gathered her things and rushed out the door. Running in heels was not easy and she got a large amount of odd looks as she begged the elevator doors to open. The thirty floor ride up seemed to be happening in slow motion as she tapped her foot impatiently. She had to catch him before he left for the day. The doors opened and she headed towards his office. Two tall men in black suits stood guard over his door and stopped her.

"Mr. Kaiba specifically instructed he was not to be disturbed at the present." One of them said in an extremely gruff voice.

"Please, I have some extremely important information that he needs to see right away."

"Name?"

"Elaina Havert." The man pulled out a small phone and looked through it before placing it back in his pocket.

"You do not have an appointment. Please return to the lobby and make an appointment with the hostess and Mr. Kaiba will fit you in as soon as his schedule permits it."

"I need to see him now, it's important."

"Any questions or concerns are to be directed to your supervisor."

"I can't do that."

"And why not?"

"It concerns him." The door suddenly opened and an extremely irritated Seto Kaiba looked out.

"What is all this noise, Roalnd? I specifically asked not to be disturbed." She became extremely small under his harsh gaze.

"I attempted to explain the situation, Mr. Kaiba. She is being particularly stubborn." He snorted.

"Then physically remove her. I don't have time for this today." As the men moved forward and Kaiba turned to shut the door she made her move.

"Steven Brace is stealing company money." Kaiba stopped suddenly. He turned back around and gave her a stern look.

"Impossible."

"I have proof." He stepped back leaving the doorway open.

"We are not to be disturbed. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir." She slipped under his arm and he shut the door.

"That is a stacked accusation. I hope you have your facts straight." He could not believe his ears.

"I walked into my office this afternoon and was about to get to work but when I opened the Master Accounting Book some of the pages were missing. Every page that held Personnel Business Expenses was gone."

"How do you know you didn't just get the pages misconstrued? They are not numbered."

"I have them color coded for easy access." He raised his eyebrow at the colorful strips of paper protruding from the sides. "Each marker corresponds with a colored pen and if you look inside when you reach the green mark the inks no longer match. There is no green ink in the book at all." He flipped through the book. She had gone above and beyond what was required of her. And she was correct. Even though it didn't seem as though any pages had been removed it seemed obvious that she was correct.

"You could have simply not used the correct pen."

"I have a second untouched account of the book that I take home with me." She handed him the small book she had used to double check her work before she went to bed. "All of the pages that are missing in the company book are still recorded in that book along with all of the receipts that correspond." She pulled the pile of envelops and set them on his desk. He looked over the receipts and checked them with the original book. None of them were accounted for.

"And how can you connect this to Steven Brace?"

"The credit card number that has been doing most of the spending in those receipts is not currently in the hands of any employee. The last known person to have been issued this credit card was a man who was fired almost a year ago. It was documented as being handed back into Steven Brace and has not been given back out sense." She handed him the database files she had printed out. "This credit card has spent nearly $50,000 in the last six months according to the transaction history in the database and all of the receipts have been accounted for. My theory is that he has been using the money for his personal benefit seeing as most of the money has been turned into cash at various ATMs across the city and he has slipped the receipts in so that the company wouldn't become alerted that there was a sum of money not accounted for." Kaiba drank in the information as he read over the papers. How had something like this been going on right under his nose and he had not seen? $50,000 was a small chunk of change compared to how much the company was worth but he could not allow someone to sit and steal the money he had worked so hard to acquire. This needed to stop now.

"It will be looked into." He dismissed her and she headed towards the door. She had done all that she could do. The ball was in Kaiba's court now. Whether or not he wanted to pursue this was up to him. It really meant nothing to her if someone stole money from Kaiba. She looked back at Kaiba and he was staring at her intently. She blushed and rushed out the door. Kaiba leaned back and massaged the bridge of his nose. This was the last thing he could have imagined he would have to deal with today. Her logic was sound and it seemed as though there were no other explanation. And even if Brace was not behind this then someone out there was still taking money from his company.

"Roland!" The door opened immediately and one of his suited guards stepped through the doorframe.

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba, sir?" Roland was his head of security and someone who had been apart of his company since the very beginning. He was tall and lean with dark green hair and a stone face. His eyes always covered in sunglasses no one ever knew where he was looking for sure.

"Get me last night's security camera footage from office 27-44 from 11pm to 7am." Roland pulled a small tablet from the inside of his jacket pocket and pointed it towards the opposing wall. A large thin screen descended from the ceiling and covered the bookcase. The screen filled with a menu of the month's dates and September 17th was selected. The screen was replaced of a list of floors and followed by a list of office numbers. Kaiba had at least one camera fitted inside every hallway, every office. This was to deter slackers or wonton teenagers using his building as a bedroom. Elaina was sitting quietly at her desk furiously working away. He raised his eyebrow, she was still in the building an hour past her allotted work hours? He kept a close eye on the speeding clock in the lower right hand corner. It was 1:30am before she finally packed up and left. She put the duplicate black book in her bag and headed out the door. He was not exactly sure how he wanted to handle that particular issue. He was not entirely comfortable with all of Kaiba Corps expenses wandering around in a fragile high schoolers backpack even though he knew it was merely meant to make sure she did not mess up in her calculations. He supposed he admired the way she put so much extra work into his company but he would never admit it to anyone.

"What exactly are we looking for if you don't mind me asking, sir?" Kaiba did not reply. They would recognize it when they saw it. For the next few hours the tape was stagnant. No movements at all, not even a janitor. His thoughts began to falter. Maybe she was wrong. And then it happened. The office doors opened and Steven Brace stepped through the door.

"There. Stop the tape." It returned to normal speed and he leaned forward. This was what it all came down too. Steve Brace rummaged through Elaina's desk before pulling out the Master Accounting Book. He flipped it through to the green marker and ripped out the pages. He rushed over to the shredder and slipped the pages inside destroying the evidence of his transgressions. Seto leaned back and laid his hands on his stomach. That was all he needed to see. Now it was time to figure out exactly what he was going to do about the situation. This man needed to be made an example of. No one tried to screw over Seto Kaiba and got away with it.

"Come, Roland. We have a stop to make." Kaiba stood up and pressed the speaker button on his desk phone.

"How may I direct your call?" A bored female voice filled the room.

"Please inform Steven Brace that he is to meet me in the lobby within the next two minutes. Also, please make an announcement that there will be free refreshments awaiting employees for the upcoming board meeting in the lobby."

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba!" She was suddenly full of life as he hung up. No need to keep something like this private. He pulled on his white trench coat and strode out the door, his two security guards in toe. This was certainly going to be interesting.

"Attention Kaiba Corporation Employees," a soothing female voice filled her office and Elaina looked up, "there will be free refreshments available to all employees in the main lobby in preparation for tonight's Board Meeting. Please enjoy on behalf of our CEO, Mr. Seto Kaiba." Elaina rushed back to her work. She was not interested in eating at the moment. And a social gathering was even farther down on her list. Telling Kaiba about her discoveries had put her behind and she knew she did not have time to eat. Her phone ringing made her jump slightly.

"Hello?"

"Mr. Seto Kaiba has requested your attendance in the Main Lobby immediately." Elaina blinked. What could he possibly want now? And why had he called her to a place the entire building was going to be at? He was her employer and she couldn't keep him waiting no matter what it was. It could involve her firing if she did. As the elevator doors opened and she slipped out she stopped. There was a large circle of suits surrounding Kaiba and Steven Brace.

"Would you like to explain to me why $50,000 has been spent in the preceding six months while in your possession?" His voice boomed over the murmuring crowd. Brace was shaking in his overpriced shoes now.

"I do not know what you are talking about Mr. Kaiba. All of the company credit cards are accounted for in the database." Kaiba smirked and shoved some papers in his face.

"Then why is the database telling me that a card that has not been issued to anyone in nearly a year is still being charged on a consistent basis?"

"It could have been stolen, sir. I run nearly five hundred different company cards." The two guards came jogging into the room.

"We found the card in his rest drawer, sir." Kaiba never took his eyes off of Brace who continued to shrink under the gaze.

"The man who held that card was fired nearly a year ago, he could have simply written down the numbers and continued to use the card! It was never deactivated!" Kaiba outstretched his hand and the green haired guard handed him a remote. Kaiba aimed the remote at the windows which conjoined into a large wall of screens, creating a large television on the side of the building. A short clip played of Brace in an overcoat sneaking to one of the ATM machines across town and withdrawing a large stack of bills. The screen was enhanced to show the credit card number used. It was the same credit card number as the one in question.

"Care to explain?" Brace looked around in fear.

"You can't prove anything. I have been a faithful employee from the day I started working for you." Kaiba raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest. The screen shifted to the scene of him tearing pages from the Master Accounting Book and discarding of them in the shredder. There was a large gasp of disbelief among the crowd.

"I have a full account of the logs you attempted to destroy in this book here. You should have been more careful. Security get this man out of my site, you are fired. Expect a call from my lawyers in the morning." Men in full police uniform walked through the door and tackled Brace to the ground as he attempted to flee the scene. Seto Kaiba's gaze shifted over the crowd and directly on Elaina. How he had found her in the crowd she had no idea. She blushed and rushed back to her office before the crowd could turn and see where he was looking. She didn't like it when Seto Kaiba stared at her that way. It made her extremely uncomfortable and she had to get back to work.

But she could not deny that there was a deep sense of self satisfaction running through her veins. She felt like she had accomplished something good for the first time in a long time. And it wasn't something only about her she had done something substantial for someone else. Why that someone else had to be Seto Kaiba, someone who would never appreciate what she had done, she had no idea. But she felt good as she sat in her chair and looked at the piles of papers on her desk. Even though she knew she had a mountain of work and was hours behind, she still felt in an extremely upbeat mood. She leaned back in her chair and childishly balanced a pencil on the end of her nose.

"Just because you removed a leech from my company doesn't mean you get to slack off, Havert." Elaina nearly tipped back in her chair as Kaiba stood in the doorway. He smirked and shut the door behind him as her hands clasped in her lap and she blushed furiously. "No matter how much I despise to admit this out loud… you did a service to my company. Don't let it go to your head!" He snapped as a small smile began to creep onto her lips. "You have however put me into a difficult spot now that I have just fired and ruined an Accounting Supervisor in the middle of a business week. However… you have put more initiative into this company than any new employee I have ever seen with such a simple task given to you. Even though it goes against my better judgment and it is only temporary I might as well give you the job for the time being. Try not to screw it up. It WILL be the end of you."

"Thank you." He kept a long gaze on her before turning around.

"That's Mr. Kaiba or sir. You are to report to me every evening at 9pm with an end of the day report. Don't be late." He kept track of her out of the corner of his eye as he walked out the door. After today he had a tad bit of faith in her that he held in very few in his life. He was hoping that she wouldn't fail in this large task that he had given to her and if she did he would ultimately be the one paying for it. But he, at the moment, did not have time to be searching for a new head of his financial department. He had a lot on his plate with the upcoming board meeting tonight. Even though his company was so large and self sustaining he no longer needed investors pouring money into his projects, more money would always be helpful. He had a grand idea in store and he would need all the help he could get. Hopefully, the simple little blonde would not be a hindrance in his plans.


	11. Dirt Mature Content

Elaina slept extremely well that night and woke up feeling refreshed and energized. She had not felt this good about anything in an extremely long time. She blinked slowly as she pulled her school uniform over the necklace. The Spirit had not come to bother her in an awful long time. Not that she was sorry for this, it was nice to get some peace and quiet from the tyrant. But she was beginning to worry that maybe she had only hallucinated the whole thing and she was going crazy.

"Missing me, are we?" She whirled around. The white haired man was laying on her bed smirking at her.

"Not at all." He looked at her knowingly but said nothing more on the subject.

"You seem extremely pleased with yourself. What have you done? Something extremely boring I presume?" Her life was not something he was extremely interested. She never did anything exciting, it seemed it involve a lot of sitting and a lot of papers. He had spent most of his time inside the Sennen Ring. As long as she wasn't trying to get rid of him there was no need to actually interact with her. As a 5,000 year old spirit he needed little to survive and there was not much he hadn't experienced.

"I got a promotion at my job." These words meant nothing to him. He longed once more for him to be back in his own era. But time was now lost to him. The Pharaoh had returned to his time and without the Pharaoh collecting the other Sennen Items was a mute point. He needed the Pharaoh and the Sennen Stone, both of which were unattainable. He was stuck in this place without a goal which made his inhabitance all but useless aside from toying around with his host. That had become extremely boring as of late. She didn't seem to have much will to fight back when he did decide to play. Not that he was upset with the reaction but never having any defiance from his host made it difficult to have reason to continue messing with her.

"Interesting." He made sure to sound extremely bored as to not to confuse her. The last thing he needed was for her to go into a boring monologue. He wanted to quickly escape the bright light of the sun. He preferred to do his work in the dead of night.

"Try not to hurt yourself. I may need that body later and I don't need it to be to tired." And he disappeared. Even Bakura couldn't upset her today. The day continued on completely smoothly. Almost every teacher accepted her work late after hearing what she had been doing the last few days. Even though she fibbed slightly, she was happy that she was no longer behind in her schoolwork. Kaiba rolled his eyes but smirked to himself. He supposed he didn't mind that she was now back in the running.

Elaina halted as she tried to open her office door and it was locked. She never locked her door since there was little to steal and the building was completely looked over with cameras. She pulled out the keys and opened the door. The room was completely spotless as if nothing had ever been here in the first place. All that was left was a small box with a white envelope on top. A small KC lined with silver rested in the lower left hand corner.

Elaina,  
>Meet me in Office 54 on Floor 51.<br>Sincerely,  
>Seto Kaiba, CEO<p>

Elaina blinked slowly before turning around and locking the door behind her. Why had Kaiba cleared her office without telling her? Had he taken back his decision? If he wanted to fire her then why not just summon her to his office? None of this made any sense to her as she walked out of the elevator and into the long hallway. The hallway was lined with thick oak doors each with a solid gold number engraving with a matching plaque. It seemed that this was the High Executive Office floor. Why had Kaiba asked her to come here? Office 54 had no sign on the front as if it had been removed. She knocked gingerly but no answer came. She waited a moment before turning the handle and was surprised to see that it was already open.

Elaina peaked inside and was shocked at what she saw. The office was bright with white carpets and walls and was spotless as if no one had ever been inside. There were large windows behind the new cherry desk in the middle of the room. Large lush green plants sat in the four corners and atop the large bookcases. There was a hand carved crystal sculpture of a Blue Eyes White Dragon that looked as though it was custom made. She stared at the beautiful creature in awe.

"Consider it a thank you for saving me possible millions." Seto Kaiba walked through the door silently. Elaina blushed as she touched the desk gently. "This is your office now that the prior inhabitant has no use for it. Use it well." A golden plaque with her name on it rested in the middle of the desk.

Elaina Havert  
>Head of Accounting<p>

As she picked it up to ceremoniously place it on the door she realized that the door was a tad too large for her short stature. Curse her extremely short legs! She didn't trust to make a food of herself in front of someone who she seemed to have finally nailed respect in. Kaiba seemed to read her mind and took the plaque from her hands and placed it firmly on the door.

"Don't make me regret this." She looked back out the large window without replying. She would do her absolute best not to disappoint him. He watched her closely as if awaiting for her to make a move. She wasn't exactly sure what he was expecting her to do. She made her way to the window and looked out. She faced the village side that showed little buildings and more trees and foliage. The trees were starting to change colors and were seas of red, orange and yellow. She had the best view in the building.

"It's beautiful." She said to herself softly.

"Yes, it is." She turned around and raised her eyebrow at Kaiba. He cleared his throat and stepped forward. "Of course it is. I couldn't have my Head of Accounting sitting in some dump. The coming investors would have a field day with that..." He trailed off for a moment as if lost in thought. She waited for him to continue. There apparently was something large going on soon that she was not aware of. Maybe this was what he had come down for. There was no reason for the busy CEO to give her an office welcoming party.

"Is there something I should be preparing for, Mr. Kaiba?" Seto gave her a look before continuing on with his speech.

"I have a future project that I have in the works that I was not planning on releasing to anyone until the foundations had been set. However, the prospecting investors in my company have decided that they wish to hold a meeting a little earlier than expected.

So I need to have someone to deal with the finances without me having to check everything over seven times. Brace may have been smart but he was arrogant. Who knows how many others discovered his secret but were discarded before they could alert me. Hmph, I will not be able to supervise you over the next week so try not to screw up. And if any investors come by to ask you questions, do try to act normal. You do represent me and this company in a larger form now. Try not to embarrass me." How many times was he going to use this on her. She wasn't going to let him down.

"Of course, sir." He smirked and walked out the door, closing it behind him. She felt a large weight lifted off of her shoulders now that she knew of his intentions. It seemed that she was here to stay and he seemed relatively pleased. As she sat down the weight of the necklace made her feel suddenly heavy. She pulled it off without a second thought and threw it into her bag. Bakura stirred as he felt his connection with his host waver. It felt as though she was farther away and he frowned. He hadn't felt any disturbance in her mind that suggested he was thinking of getting rid of the Ring. She had however seemed to have taken it off.

"What are you doing?" Bakura appeared on the desk, his legs on either side of her chair. "Why have you removed the Ring?"

"I was feeling a little hot so I decided to take it off for a while." He raised an eyebrow at him. She couldn't lie to him whether she was wearing it or not and she was telling the truth.

"Put it back on, now."

"I will in a few minutes. I haven't taken it off once in almost a month. I just need a little break." His eyes sharpened but said nothing else. He sadly could not force her to put the Ring back on. He could only fear her into putting it back on. Only if the host was physically touching skin to gold could he take over their body. However, their minds were permanently linked. She could not think about getting rid of the Sennen Ring without him hearing everything. And then he would be sure to _change _ her mind. He disappeared and she let out a sigh of relief. She liked being free of the thing if only for a few hours while she worked. The necklace was made of solid gold and was fairly large which made it tiring to lug it around all day everyday. She generally became so engrossed with her work that she hardly noticed but today was just one of those muggy September afternoons.

The day seemed to rush by as people bustled in and out of her office all day. Some were to give her needed paperwork so that she could properly fill out the Master Accounting Book which she demanded to be rewritten. Not having the colors in proper order bothered her OCD and would not rest until she completely rewrote the book in proper fashion.

She knew she should have just waited to take it home and finish it on her own time but her mind would not let her rest. Some of the visitors however were employees bearing her gifts and praise. Apparently, Kaiba had a lot of loyal followers that worked for him. Her office was littered with every color flower and present wrapper imaginable. It was like she was getting suffocated by a rainbow. She attempted to force herself not to rearrange the flowers based on color but her mind kept pestering. By the time she had finished these two unneeded tasks it was 2am and she had not gotten any work done.

She quickly packed her things and decided, against her better judgment , to leave all of the paperwork at the office. She would work double the speed to be able to catch up on the days lost work. She would also have to remember to bring in something that could water the plants. It had gone from sticky and muggy to frigid in the matter of a few hours and she pulled her suit jacket close. Everything was within walking distance of her small apartment so she never learned to drive. The expenses of a car were vast and unneeded if she could just walk wherever she needed to go.

"Ring, Elaina." An extremely irritated looking Spirit appeared beside her and she jumped. She really needed to stop being so twitchy. She had totally forgotten about the necklace due to her workload.

"I'll put it on when I get inside." He growled. He was sick of these games. He was substantially weaker when his host was not in contact with the Ring and her simply putting the Ring back on would make him feel better.

"Now." She gave him a look and his eyes sharpened.

"I want to wait until we get inside. I don't want to take it out in the middle of the street and someone try to steal it from me. It's solid gold and obviously valuable."

"But if you would just put it on I could take over your body and send the fool who would dare try to the Shadow Realm."

"The what...?"

"The Shadow Realm, it is..." Elaina had the wind knocked out of her as she was sent crashing to the ground. Her hands and knees bled slightly as they scrapped across the rough concrete of the side walk. Her partially open bag sent the Sennen Ring sliding into the street.

"Lookie what I found." A deep voice ringed in her ears as she rolled over to look behind her. A tall man with his face covered in a jacket hood stood above her snickering hysterically.

"What do you want..." She had never been robbed before and she had hoped that she would never have to experience it. She had little on her of value apart from the necklace.

"Good question. Let me show you." He reached forward and grabbed a handful of her hair. He yanked her forward roughly so she was on her hands in knees. He continued laughing as he pulled her into the nearby alleyway. Trash cans lay scattered everywhere and the ground was dirty and dark. He pulled her by her hair into the alley like a dog on a leash. He had a firm grasp and she had no means of escape, unless she could tear the hair out of her head. She heard the sound of a zipper and she jumped. She finally understood was happening. Suddenly, she began to thrash violently. She had to get away.

Bakura ran to the alley feeling his host in distress. A tall man pushed her down onto the dirty stone floor. Her hands were being held behind her back as her clavicle was against the ground. He kept her on her knees as he removed his trousers. Bakura growled viciously, he would not allow this man to continue any further. An invisible wall hit him as he began to enter the alleyway. He whirled around and stared at the Sennen Ring discarded in the middle of the street with horror. There was nothing he could do now. He turned back with disdain. The man had pushed her suit skirt up and pulled her underwear down to her knees. Elaina turned her head towards him as the man grasped onto her hips. Her eyes were hollow and no tears escaped them. Her face was void of all emotion as if she was transferring herself into a different place. Bakura looked on helpless as the man pushed inside her viciously.

Bakura watched as blood slid down her thighs, she was a virgin. She didn't flinch as the man pushed into her and spouted off any demeaning phrase he could think of. If she could endure it, he could watch. Her eyes never left Bakuras as the man finished embarrassingly quickly and dressed himself. She lay on the ground unable to move as the man walked into the street and picked up the Sennen Ring. Bakura smirked and appeared before the man.

"How lucky am I that you were foolish enough to pick up my Ring." The man jumped.

"Who the fuck are you! I saw it first."

"I am your worst nightmare and I hope you enjoyed taking advantage of my host. It will be the last thing you ever do." The Sennen Ring floated out of the mans hands and latched itself into his chest. The man screamed as the Ring slowly began to turn, cutting a large hole around his heart. Bakura stared into the eyes of the frightened man as the light left them. The prongs of the Ring drove into the mans heart and tore it from his chest as it fell to the asphalt. Bakura stepped back as the man hit the ground. He looked at his host as she laid in the alley. There was no one around to help her and he needed her to get the Ring.

"Hurry, get up." He couldn't stand weakness and his inability to do anything in this situation made him extremely uncomfortable. She raised herself slowly and fixed her attire. Slowly, she made her way over to the Ring and grabbed it, clutching it to her chest. The blood stained her white shirt as Bakura felt his power return to him. Bakura slipped into her body silently and felt first hand the pain her body felt. Her hands and knees bled and her pelvis ached. But Bakura stood on stronger legs and walked her home after grabbing her discarded things from the sidewalk. His host did not cry or even protest as he pushed the door open and lead her to her bedroom.

"I need to take a shower." Her voice was broken and Bakura said nothing before relinquishing his power over her. Elaina pulled off her clothes and threw them in the garbage. She wanted to get rid of them as soon as possible. She kept the heavy golden around her neck, it gave her comfort knowing it was there with her. She should have never taken it off in the first place. She should have listened to the Spirit. The bathroom was bright and clean as she locked the door behind her. She was alone in the house but she didn't feel safe. The water was scalding as she stepped into the bathtub and shut the curtains. The water that pooled around her feet was brown and red as the dirt and blood slid from her skin. The steaming water stung as it hit the open wounds that were scattered across her body. Gravity was taking its tole as a thick white substance slid down her legs and she leaned out of the bathtub to vomit into the nearby trashcan. She felt disgusting.

Bakura waved away the thick steam as he appeared in the corner. His host could not see him and he watched her dispose of the contents in her stomach. She poured a thick white substance onto a cloth and the room smelled of vanilla as she began to scrub furiously at her skin. She scrubbed until her skin was raw and nearly bleeding. She was panting heavily as if she was trying desperately to scrub away the incident she had experienced tonight. She knew she was never going to be clean. She was going to be tainted for the rest of her life. Her mind that was usually attempting to keep track of hundreds of different things was suddenly very blank. She couldn't think of anything except getting clean. The spirit watched as she sat in the bathtub for hours just scrubbing at her skin. For the first time in his life he felt helpless. It was not very often that he felt the need to do something for his hosts but this was one of these times. He still needed her alive and her spirit had just seemed so torn down he wasn't sure what was going to happen.

Elaina laid in the bathtub until the water was clear and she had fallen asleep. Bakura revealed himself and walked across the room. He turned the water off and lifted her out of the frigid water. The lights turned off and the door shut behind him. The candles throughout the room lit on their own as he laid his frail host down in her bed. He wrapped her in the heavy blankets scattered across her bed. The device beside her bed that made annoyingly loud noises in the early hours of the morning shut off. He laid down as the door shut on its own and watched his host as she clutched the blankets like a child. He had done everything that he could do at this point.


	12. Shock

The last month and a half had been absolutely awful. Elaina had eaten only enough to keep her heart beating and the little that she did eat she could hardly keep down. She was always shaking and looking around her as if waiting for someone to jump her. She hardly got any of her homework done and her duties at Kaiba Corp were slipping through her fingers. She only wanted to lay in bed ad hide from the world when she got home from work. The plants in her office had slowly begun to die off along with her self-esteem. She always worried someone would find out just by looking at her. She didn't want to be in all of these crowds. She just wanted to be alone. Every morning she woke up and got sick even though she was never running a fever or having any flu symptoms.

Elaina hadn't been to a doctor or to the police. There were reports on the news of a man laying in the middle of the street with his heart missing. She couldn't go to the police and explain that the man had raped her and her necklace that held the Spirit of a 5,000 year old dead man had killed him. And if she went to the doctor Kaiba would find out. No one would believe her. Everyone would think she was crazy. She stared at her desk quietly as the teacher walked past her. They didn't even ask her for her work anymore, they knew they would get the same answer they had gotten the last several weeks.

Seto looked up from his book irritated as he handed in his papers. Another day Elaina hadn't finished her work. More than likely she would show up again tonight and stare at the walls for several hours before calling for a cab to take her home. Ever since a month ago when he had given her the promotion she had stopped walking home. He had refrained from firing her, hoping that the silly slump would end and he wouldn't have to deal with the inevitable tabloids that would pick up on the story if he did. Elaina suddenly felt extremely sick. She had been getting sick every morning for the past week but it was generally just after waking up. She had never gotten sick in the middle of school.

"May I be excused?" She wasn't sure how long she would be able to keep her queasiness under control.

"You may." The teacher replied surprised. Even though she hadn't been putting as much effort into her school work as usual she had never left in the middle of class. She rushed towards the Nurses office bathroom and began to vomit. Why was she getting sick so often. She didn't feel like she was catching a cold. She always felt completely fine except for the sickness in the morning. She didn't want to be here anymore. "Can I go home?" She felt foolish being seventeen and requesting to go home. However, it was a school policy. The school nurse looked at her quizzically. She looked pale and frail but let alone fine.

"Name?"

"Elaina Havert." What did that have to with anything? The nurse spent a few seconds typing on the computer. Elaina Havert was a straight A student who had yet to miss a day of school since she had transferred here. If she was asking to leave then she must be more ill than she was leading on.

"The phone is on the table over there. Call someone to pick you up." Elaina flushed and rushed over to the phone. The nurse was assuming she would call a family member who would rush to her rescue with a ride home and chicken soup. In reality, she would be calling a cab. The only family she had was her father and he was far from the type of family most people wanted. She rushed out of the room and gathered her things. Kaiba didn't take his eyes off of her as she pushed her books into her bag and excused herself from class. His meeting was tonight and he had foolishly counted on her to be there. Goes to show he had no one to count on but himself. The teacher didn't bother to give Elaina her assignment for the night, assuming that she wouldn't do it even if he did.

Elaina laid in the back of the cab trying to hold down the stomach acid. She hadn't eaten anything in days and she was still getting sick. None of this made any sense at all. She rushed to the bathroom and vomited again before crawling into bed. Her appointment book laid sprawled open on the floor next to the bed. A little red drop of water etched into the second Mondays box made her blink. It was the end of October and she had her last period was the middle of September. She had never been late. She picked up the book and flipped through it quickly. Every second Monday of every month the past two years was a little red water drop she had drawn in. She had missed this month and was two weeks late. Was she...

Seto Kaiba typed furiously a few miles away. Not only had he needed to finish his own daily work but he had needed to finish Elaina's as well. The investors were coming any minute and he had no report from his financial department on how much money he would need to spend and more importantly how much money he was going to gain from this upcoming announcement to show them. She had really screwed him over and he was going to give her a piece of his mind tonight. He brought up her employee page in the database and scribbled down her address.

Elaina wrapped her sweater tightly around her body as she walked into the nearby convenient store. She was completely covered in baggy clothes as she had been for the past month. She detested wearing the skimpy school uniform now more than ever. She had never really liked the short skirt and tight blouse. She blushed as she turned into the parental section. Diapers, baby food and pregnancy tests littered the shelves. She had never dreamed in a million years that she would ever be here. But she had to find out if it was true. Stress was known to throw off female menstrual cycles and she was definitely stressed out. She had no idea what any of these devices did and what one she should select. They all seemed to say the same things. But she wanted to get out of here as soon as possible. The last thing she needed was for someone from school who recognized her to waltz in.

"Hello, how are you today?" The young cashier smiled at her generically. Elaina made no reply and gingerly laid the pregnancy test on the counter. The cashier raised an eyebrow but said nothing of it. "We're holding a sale on condoms if you're interested." Elaina blushed.

"No thank you..." The cashier rung up the item as Elaina rummaged through her pockets and a pang of horror ran through her mind. She hadn't brought any cash on her. The only thing she could use was the Kaiba Corp issued Business card. She hadn't had a credit card to attach her weekly check to so Kaiba just gave her a credit card issued by the company. Somehow he knew she didn't require much money to live like he did. Could she risk Kaiba finding out about her purchase? But she just had to know and paying the cab double would cost more than just using the card. She pulled out the blue plastic card and handed it to the cashier. She raised her eyebrow but rung it up and handed her a white plastic bag.

"Thank you for your purchase. We hope to see you again soon." Elaina sure didn't. She rushed out the door and climbed back into the cab.

Seto Kaiba stormed out of his office extremely irritated. The investor meeting had gone on just as he had suspected. Something so hyped up had only lasted minutes and all they wanted to know was how he was going to combat the firing of his Head of Accounting as his replacement being MIA. He hadn't even gotten the chance to talk to them about the future of Kaiba Corp. His limo was sitting at the front of the building, waiting for him as instructed. He handed the driver a piece of paper detailing the instructions on how to get to Elaina's apartment before climbing inside the car. He had just about enough of this foolishness and he was going to shake her out of this slump or fire her. He had a company to run and he didn't have time for games.

Elaina sat on the couch in her dark apartment. Her hands were shaking as she tapped her foot against the carpet. She had to wait five minutes for the test to tell her her future. She prayed to whatever God was listening that the test came back negative. She hadn't had sex before in her life and not again since a month ago. If she was pregnant then the father would be... She couldn't be pregnant. She just couldn't be. The little timer on her oven rang and she looked back at the test sitting on the table. With shaking hands she picked up the test and read the results.

**Pregnant**

This had to be a mistake. How could she be pregnant. She dropped the test onto the table and rushed to the bathroom. She felt sick. The spirit of the Ring appeared beside her as she leaned over the toilet. Had he heard her correctly? Was she carrying a child? The spirit had felt a sudden spark of life recently but he had attuned it to his host. He assumed that she would be soon getting back on her feet. He could not have guessed that it was because she was creating a new life.

Seto Kaiba stood in front of the large apartment complex. The building looked old and run down with paint peeling in obvious places. Why was she staying in a dump like this? He pulled a handkerchief from his trench coat pocket and used it to protect his skin from the dirty door handle. He looked for an elevator but found nothing but a rickety set of creaking wooden stairs. He scoffed and ascended them quickly. He needed to get home and take a shower to wash the filth that hung in the air. He would have to have a talk with her about new living locations. The press would have a field day with this. That is if she still worked for him by tomorrow. He stopped at a door with a chipped white eighteen above the peephole. He knocked curtly and folded his arms across his chest. He could guess that she rarely got visitors and awaited a hasty reply. His frown deepened and knocked again. If she was sick enough that she could not finish her day at school or show up to her job then she couldn't possibly be out and about. Out of frustration he grabbed onto the handle and to his surprise it was open. Elaina hadn't struck him as the kind of person that left her doors unlocked.

"Havert?" He walked inside and looked around. Earthy tones and books as far as the eye could see. He ducked under the low ceiling. The midget may be able to stand this cramped space but he could not. The small television opposite the couch was turned off and the entire apartment was eerily silent. Her keys were laying on the cloudy glass coffee table. She was home. Maybe he should have told her he was stopping by to yell at her so she could have at least not been asleep when he arrived. "Elaina?" Something on the table caught his eyes as he did another sweep of the room. Sitting next to her keys was a Home Pregnancy Test. He hadn't recalled her saying anything about having a boyfriend and she didn't seem the type for casual sex. He picked it up curiously even though he knew what the results would be. There was no possible way that she could be pregnant unless by some Divine Intervention. Not that he believed in such a thing.

**Pregnant**

Seto almost dropped the pregnancy test in shock. How could this have happened? She had gotten herself stuck with some other mans child? How could she have been so foolish. He looked around for the trademarks of another man and found none. Had she gotten knocked up? He growled in frustration and gripped onto the test angrily. This couldn't be. No one was allowed to touch her. She was... _**his. **_He looked up from his own thoughts. No, he didn't care. Let her do what she wanted with her life. Let her destroy everything she had ever worked just for some superficial pleasure. What did he care? He dropped the test onto the table as if it had bitten him and walked out the door.


End file.
